


The Boy of My Dreams

by inklizard



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Resbang 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-20 08:33:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 29,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30002136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inklizard/pseuds/inklizard
Summary: The scars from Italy are more than skin deep. When recurring nightmares begin to affect Maka as well as Soul, she is forced to confront lingering feelings of failure and responsibility, along with something new—something more complicated. Meanwhile, Soul tries to understand how to help her cope as he deals with a demon of his own.
Relationships: Maka Albarn/Soul Eater Evans
Comments: 13
Kudos: 30





	1. Good Night, Sleep Tight

**Author's Note:**

> I want to real quick thank my artists, betas, and friends for keeping me going through this thing. I kind of can’t believe we did it. Look for my artists’ really truly amazing art throughout the fic! I am blown away by all the support from you guys. It’s been a blast working with you.

Panicked. Paralyzed. Pulsing.

Underneath the sound of blood thrumming in her ears, she could hear the beating of a heart that was not her own. Invisible hands held her where she stood, grabbing her legs and twisting cold fingers into her skin. On the back of her tongue, she tasted copper, but knew intuitively that she was not bleeding. Where did it come from? Why did the air around her smell like blood?

No time to think. There was a weight bearing down on her. Something was coming; something she could not see. It was so dark, but she could feel the presence pushing its way toward her, crawling, lurching, dragging itself ever closer as she tried to struggle free of the hands that held her. Dread swelled so violently in her that she could feel it in her throat, choking her. Her blood was so cold it burned in her veins.

“Maka!” The voice of her weapon pierced the silence of the room around her. Hearing it made her heart seize. Something was wrong. Something was so, so wrong.

Do something.

No time.

It’s here.

All of a sudden, Soul was in front of her and the smell of iron in the air was sickening. She could hear the sounds of flesh ripping and twisting and the heavy thump of his body hitting the floor at her feet. The heartbeat that was not hers stopped.

She screamed his name so loudly it felt like her throat would bleed.

Maka sat bolt upright in her bed. She was cold, and her pajamas, damp with sweat, clung to her skin. Wide-eyed, she looked around the room, trying to make sense of where she was and what had happened. The memory of the dark, cold room and the feeling of icy fingers holding her down clung to her mind like a thick, black fog. Without thinking, she kicked her blankets off of her, claustrophobic, hating the weight on her legs. It made her want to crawl out of her skin.

There was no time to get her bearings. A sudden sound from behind her bedroom wall sent a jolt through her already frayed nerves. It was the familiar thump of something falling, hitting the hard tile floor. Then there was a hoarse wail of distress, followed by frantic scrabbling and sprinting footfalls heading for her room. She realized too late that although the cold and the choking feeling had abated, the back of her throat still felt raw.

The last thing she remembered was hearing herself scream for Soul.

Something heavy hit her bedroom door. Then she heard a yelp and the clatter of the doorknob. No sooner had the latch clicked than Soul shouldered it open, hurling it aside with such force that it smacked against the wall behind it.

“What?” he wheezed, scrambling to her bedside and throwing himself onto the mattress beside her. “What’s wrong?”

For a moment, she couldn’t answer. All she could do was stare blankly up at her partner, a small, nauseous part of her almost surprised to see him there. Everything was still falling back into place inside her head.

“Maka!” Soul reached for her upper arm and grabbed it, pulling her toward him and leaning down to meet her line of sight. His eyes were wild and full of confusion, searching hers for answers she was not sure she could give. Trying to avoid his gaze, hers flickered down toward her lap, but was caught by the gnarled line of still-raw flesh that carved its way across his bare chest.

Reality suddenly reinstated itself.

Maka’s mouth fell open. The memory of the dark, moonlit church, not so different from the inky black room she found herself in that night—she felt it in her stomach when it hit her. She remembered everything in an instant: the ice in her veins; the horrible, ear-piercing wails of the Demon Sword; the smell of Soul’s blood so thick in the air she could taste it. Most vividly of all, she remembered the feeling of abject helplessness, kneeling there next to him as he bled, hoping against hope that she would get to see him open his eyes again, and knowing all the while that if he never did, it would be all her fault.

Darkness swam around the edges of her vision, and her stomach rolled over itself. She felt like she was going to be sick.

Soul was still trying to get through to her, but he sounded far away. “What happened?” she heard him say. “Are you okay? Maka!”

“I’m s—” The words fell from her lips like little shards of broken glass, and, embarrassed, she paused, dragging in a shaky breath. The corners of her mouth quivered with the threat of tears. “I’m sorry,” she said slowly, trying to keep her voice from trembling like the rest of her.

She still refused to look at him. Her gaze was somewhere far away.

“Sorry?” said Soul. “What’re you talking about? Sorry for what?”

All she could do was squeeze her eyes shut and shake her head.

What could she say? She could have told him it was all okay, but he would never have believed her; not after that. Would he have been upset if he knew she woke him up in the dead of night because of a bad dream? Guilt twisted her gut. Had she not put him through enough already?

Soul must not have cared, because next thing she knew, he took her by the shoulders and pulled her into his arms. Breath hitching in her throat, she crashed limply into his chest, and as soon as she did, she could feel his heart trying to beat its way out of him. Hers cracked down the middle. Trembling hands grasped at the back of her nightshirt, and next to her ear, she heard him trying to steady his ragged breathing. He was scared, but trying so hard not to be.

“Hey,” came his voice from above her head. It was quiet and rough from sleep, but tender as could be. “Look, I got you,” he said into her hair. “You’re fine, okay? It’s fine.”

A shallow breath fought its way down her throat, only for her shuddering chest to force it back up moments later in a sob that shook her whole body. She grit her teeth and balled up her fists and shut her eyes so, so tight, trying her hardest to bite back the tears, but there was nothing she could do.

Soul was so good to her—always there for her when she needed him; always running when she called—and just look at what she had done.

“Oh, my God, Maka.” Soul squeezed her so tightly it almost hurt. “I'm begging you,” he said, “tell me what’s wrong.”

When she opened her mouth, a whimper wriggled its way out of her. It was hard to speak around the lump that had lodged itself in the bottom of her throat, but she knew she had to try. Even if it meant he would be angry with her, she owed it to him to explain.

She sniffled, crinkling her nose, and breathed out slowly.

“I…had a nightmare,” she admitted. Hearing herself say it aloud made her feel even more foolish than she already did. All this over a dream.

No—all this because of her failure.

She buried her face into the crook of Soul’s neck, digging her nails into the palms of her hands.

For a moment, Soul was quiet. She could feel him holding his breath, but did not know why. Then, at length, he swallowed and said, “A nightmare?”

Those words crashed down onto her, crushing her, forcing out of her another half-choked sob. A nightmare; just a nightmare. “I’m sorry,” was all she could say.

“What? No,” said Soul. “I didn’t mean it like that.” He squirmed so that he could rest his chin on top of her head. “C’mon, knock it off. It’s okay.”

She almost went on, wanting to apologize for waking him up; scaring him; making him think something was wrong when all it was was a bad dream. She held her tongue, though. All he would have said was that it was okay, and not to worry, and somehow, that would have made her feel even worse.

So there she sat, curled up in a ball against her partner, her legs folded in his lap, hands resting on his chest. She poured all of her attention into the feeling of his heartbeat against her cheek. The sound of it set her at ease, reminding her that, in spite of what they had been through, he was still there with her. He was okay.

In her head, she counted each rhythmic thump, and tried to slow her breathing to match his. It was difficult at first. The longer she listened, though, the easier it became.

All the while, Soul held on to her, rubbing slow circles underneath her shoulders. His head was heavy on top of hers. He must have been tired, she thought, and it tugged at her heart. Even so, she was grateful for the weight; it kept her grounded while she struggled to slow the tears.

What must have been a matter of minutes felt so much longer. Eventually, though, the sobs turned to whimpers, and the whimpers, too, faded in time as the tears on her cheeks began to dry.

Soul eased up his hold on her, and his voice filled the silence between them. “You better now?” he asked.

She nodded the best she could in reply.

Suddenly, the weight of his head on top of hers was gone. She felt him shift so that he could look down at her, and then he said, “Do you wanna tell me what happened?”

This time, she shook her head “no.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.” Her voice was still thick from crying, but no longer cracked and faltered like it did before. “I just wanna forget about it.”

Soul looked at her, lips pressed into a pensive frown. She could tell by the way he hesitated that he knew something was not right, but he must have been afraid of upsetting her again, because he did not push; all he said was: “Okay.”

Then he started to let go of her, and for some reason, it scared her, like if she could no longer touch him, he would disappear. A bolt of cold fear swept through her. Without thinking, she threw her arms around his waist and fell forward, back into the familiar comfort of his embrace. Soul yelped. He swayed backward with her. She felt his spine stiffen, and heard him curse softly under his breath, but she paid it no mind. She shoved her head underneath his chin, and the sound of his heart pounding against her cheek made everything feel okay again.

Then she said to him: “Don’t leave.”

For a long while, his hands hovered awkwardly above her shoulders. The longer she clung to him, though, the more he relaxed, until eventually, he wrapped her back up in his arms, and she sighed gratefully into his chest.

It took him a moment to speak.

“You don’t, uh…” Soul started to rub his thumb up and down her back. “You don’t wanna go back to sleep?” he asked.

Go back to sleep? No, not after that. The fear of another nightmare made her feel cold all over, even in the warmth of Soul's arms. What if it happened again? What if she woke up with his name in her mouth, and he came running again, scared, thinking something was wrong when it was just a dream? Once was bad enough. She didn’t want to put him through that again, never mind herself.

Maka bit the inside of her lip.

“I don’t think I can,” she told him. “You go back to sleep, though. I don’t wanna keep you up.”

“You think I’m gonna sleep after that?” There was humor in his voice, and she wondered if he was trying to make her laugh. She did smile, but more so at the thought than the joke, if it could be called that.

“You should try,” she said. “School tomorrow.”

“Skip a day,” offered Soul. “C’mon, do you wanna stay up? We can watch a movie.”

“We can’t just skip school.”

“Sure we can.”

Just like him to say that so easily, she thought with some mirth.

“No,” said Maka, “it’s okay. Just…”

“Just what?”

She hesitated, fidgeting, staring with eyes half-open at nothing in particular. Over Soul’s shoulder, she could see the shadows of clouds dancing along the opposite wall. It frightened her. The darkness reminded her too much of the black room.

She shut her eyes again and turned to hide her face in Soul’s collar.

“Just…stay here,” she said. “I don’t wanna be alone right now.”

Silence filled the air again. Then, at length, Soul asked, “You sure you don’t wanna talk about it?”

The concern in his voice broke her heart. She should have told him; she knew that, but how? And if she did, would it have made him feel guilty, like it was his fault? That was the last thing she wanted. It had nothing to do with him; it was her. It had always been her: her decision, her recklessness, her failure.

So why, then, did he have to suffer for it? It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.

“Maka?” said Soul.

She felt tears behind her eyes again, but managed to keep her voice from cracking when she said, “Will you stay?”

Tomorrow, she thought. In the morning, she would tell him, but now, it was late, and he sounded so tired. All she wanted was for him to forget about everything and go to sleep. She wanted that for herself, too, but at the same time, she felt that sleep would not come easily for her, if it came at all.

Soul, realizing he would get nothing else out of her, sighed into her hair.

“Yeah,” he said. “I will.”

The corner of her mouth twitched with a smile that died almost as soon as it appeared.

“Thanks,” she murmured.

With that, Soul started to pull away again, and straightaway, she wanted to tighten her arms around him; bring him back to her. It still felt like he would vanish if she let go. He did not. He remained there as she reluctantly slipped her arms back from around his waist, and he did not disappear in a puff of smoke as she relaxed onto the pillow behind her. All the while, she kept her eyes on him, almost afraid to blink. He followed her, settling down next to her and pulling up the blankets she had kicked away. With an arm over her stomach, he tucked them underneath her. The weight did not bother her nearly as much as it had before, especially now that it was accompanied by the embrace of her partner—an embrace that made the darkness feel a little less oppressive, and the shadows on the wall seem less like living, breathing, crawling things.

Closing her eyes was much easier now than she thought it would be.

She wriggled a hand out from under the sheets and rested it above Soul’s elbow, giving his arm a soft squeeze. Her head lolled to the side, into his chest, and above her, she heard him chuckle under his breath. The sound coaxed her into opening her eyes again. Tipping her head back, she lifted her gaze till her eyes met his. Underneath his head, he had his arm folded, propping himself up on her pillow, and he stared steadily down at her with eyes half-shut and a small, crooked smile on his face. That smile got a little wider when she looked at him.

“What?” he said.

“You laughed.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“What’s funny?” asked Maka.

“Nothing,” said Soul. “Go to sleep.”

Maka frowned. “I told you,” she said, “I don’t think I can.”

“Well, I’m gonna stay up with you till you do.”

Her heart plummeted to the bottom of her chest. He said it so easily, as if it were the only thing he could have done.

“Soul, I don’t want you to—”

“I know,” he said, his voice quiet and thick with sleep, “but I’m gonna anyway.”

Maka wanted to argue. She wanted to tell him not to worry; to forget about her and get some rest; that she would be fine in the morning. All those words were lost, though, when he said to her: “I’m right here. Whatever’s scaring you, I’m not gonna let it get to you, okay?”

Then she understood: This was something he thought he could protect her from.

“You’re fine,” he told her, and for the third time that night, she felt like she might cry. This time, though, it was not sorrow, guilt, or regret that brought the tears to her eyes; not only, anyway. It was an array of emotions that tangled themselves together in her chest, making it feel tight—too full.

It took her a moment to realize she was smiling. It was a sad, broken little smile, but a smile nonetheless.

Soul returned it with ease, and she found her eyes wandering along the curve of his lips before she closed them again, letting her head drop back against his beating heart.

She did not remember falling asleep. One moment, she was wrapped up in the warmth of Soul’s body next to hers; the slow, steady rise and fall of his chest; the reassuring sound of his breathing. Then, suddenly, there was a noise. It was familiar, but even still, she could not place it right away, so thick was the fog of sleep that had settled inside her head.

Soul’s alarm, she thought. It was droning on and on from the other side of the apartment. That was what woke her.

Frowning, Maka shut her eyes tight, trying to ignore the sound and surrender to the sleep that still clung steadfast to her. It was no use, though. The longer she listened to the noise, the more awake she felt, and with that wakefulness came a more acute awareness of her senses.

It occurred to her that she was warm—uncomfortably so. Then, as a gush of hot breath pooled in the crook of her neck, she understood why: Soul. Blinking against the sunlight streaming in through her window, she opened her eyes to find her partner’s head resting heavily on her shoulder. He was halfway on top of her, curled protectively around her, with an arm still thrown across her stomach. During the night, one of his legs had gotten tangled up with hers. Pins and needles prickled under her skin from the pressure. In spite of the discomfort, though, she could not find it in her to move.

Soul looked so peaceful it sent an ache thrumming through her chest. He was still fast asleep, apparently unbothered by the racket from the other room.

Maka wondered how long he spent lying awake beside her, watching over her as if he could keep her safe from a nightmare. It had worked, though, she supposed. Until the alarm woke her, she had been sleeping soundly. Whether that was because of Soul’s comforting presence or her simply being too tired to dream, she was not sure, but regardless, she would happily attribute it to the former.

Again, she smiled without realizing.

“Soul,” she said softly, lifting a hand to rest on his arm.

The corners of his mouth dipped into a frown. His eyelids twitched and he knit his brow; tighter still when she gave his arm a gentle shake.

“Wake up,” said Maka. “Your alarm’s going off.”

She felt him breathe in deep—her first indication that he was awake—then let it out slowly against her neck. It tickled, and she scrunched up her nose at his morning breath. She made a good-natured noise of displeasure, and that sound seemed to draw Soul’s attention. He tried to say something—“Wha?” or “Huh?”—but it was smothered by a yawn that stiffened his whole body.

“Your alarm,” she repeated. “Go shut it off.”

Slowly, Soul lifted his head, and, blinking, opened his bleary eyes. It took him a moment to focus on her.

“Not even a ‘good morning?’” he said sleepily. “You’re the worst.”

Maka giggled—it was more of a hum, really, but the intent was there. “Morning,” she said.

“Better.”

With some effort, Soul propped himself up on his elbow, like he had been when she fell asleep. The blankets that had covered him up to his chest fell around his waist, and in the daylight, she found his scar to be all the more eye-catching. The smile on her face disappeared as soon as she saw it. Soul did not seem to notice. He closed his eyes again, lifting the arm that had been lying across her stomach so that he could rub his face.

Maka tried to look away. She dragged her gaze up from his chest to focus on his face, screwed up into a grimace as his hand raked through his messed-up hair and down the back of his neck. Something in his shoulder popped when he rolled his head forward.

One of his cheeks—the one that had been pressed against her collar all night—was pink, and on the same side, his hair was flattened, sticking up at an odd angle at the top. One corner of her mouth quirked back into an almost-smile. Was he always such a mess in the morning? She never had time to notice before.

Murmuring an incomprehensible curse word, Soul sat up, pushing the blankets off of him and onto Maka. She gathered them up in her arms, watching him out of the corner of her eye as he shuffled his way across her bedroom and out the still-open door. Soon after, the shrill ringing of his alarm stopped.

Maka pulled the covers up to her chin. It was still so warm under there; pleasantly so now that she no longer had Soul lying practically on top of her. That was not so bad, though, she thought, remembering the contented look on his sleeping face.

His words from last night came back to her: “Skip a day.” In the light of the morning, she found that idea even more tempting than it had been the night before.

She rolled onto her side, curling up where Soul had been moments ago, and let herself close her eyes. Just for a minute, she told herself, and then she would get up and get ready for class. That was the last thing she remembered before waking up again, dazed and sleep-drunk, to the feeling of a hand in her hair. Gentle fingers pushed her bangs back from her forehead, tucking the rest neatly behind her ear. She heard herself groan, though it took her a moment to realize the sound had come from her. Then, just like that, the hand was gone, snatched back as if afraid of being smacked away. There came what sounded like a sharp intake of breath above her.

At length, her eyes fluttered open. The world around her was blurry and far too bright.

Beside her, sitting on the edge of her bed, was Soul. One of his legs was crossed over the other, and in his lap were his hands. His eyes were fixed on her. For some reason, he looked nervous.

At some point, he had gotten dressed. When he left, he had been in nothing but a pair of pajama pants. Now, he was dressed in a sweatshirt and jeans, and he had fixed his hair, too. That was odd, thought Maka. How long had he been gone? Moreover, how long had she been asleep? It felt like just a moment ago she had closed her eyes. An uneasy feeling slid its way down into the bottom of her belly.

She blinked her tired eyes and dragged herself up onto her elbows, propping herself on the pillow underneath her. “Hey,” she said in a voice that was hardly her own.

“Hey,” said Soul.

Maka rubbed her face, pressing her fingers against her eyelids until she saw little red stars in the dark. “What time is it?” she asked.

“It’s, uh…” Soul’s eyes flitted away from hers and down to his lap, then back to her. “It’s about ten.”

A gush of adrenaline shot through her. All of a sudden, she felt very, very awake. “Ten?” she croaked. “Soul! Why’d you let me sleep so late?”

“You were tired,” said Soul. “I was gone for, like, two minutes, and when I came back to get you, you were already asleep again.”

“So wake me up!” snapped Maka, gathering her arms underneath her and pushing herself upright. “By the time we get to school, the day’s gonna be half over!”

“We’re not going.”

The finality of it almost offended her. Considerate of him to make that decision for both of them, thought Maka. Narrowing her eyes, she said, “Not going?”

“Yeah. I don’t know what’s wrong with you”—Maka’s frown deepened—“but I know you needed to sleep more than you needed to go to class.”

Maka opened her mouth to argue. She was about to tell him there was nothing wrong with her, and that there was no reason for him to fuss over her like he was, but as soon as the words welled up on the back of her tongue, she realized how asinine they sounded. Nothing wrong with her? Who was she fooling? Certainly not Soul.

Soul, who was always so calm, so detached, held her gaze with an unusual intensity. There was something behind his eyes—something that had been there since last night. It burned dimmer now, but even so, and even as he tried to hide it from her, she still found it there, unmistakable.

It was worry, or fear, or maybe both at once.

He looked at her now the same way he had in the dark, his hands trembling against her back as he put on a brave face. That memory extinguished the anger inside of her as quickly and effortlessly as a puff of breath on a matchstick. It, and the words that lie dead in her throat, left her in a long, heavy sigh.

“Okay,” she said. “Maybe you’re right.”

“I know I’m right,” said Soul. The abruptness of his answer nearly made her second-guess her decision not to snap at him. Before she could think better of it, though, he followed up with: “C’mon, you’ve been out for hours. You want breakfast or not?”

“You made breakfast yesterday.”

“I know that, too.”

With that, Soul moved to stand up. Maka watched him leave with her face screwed up in a half-smile.

“Can’t you just once do something nice for me without being a jerk about it?”

“Fuck you,” said Soul. “If you’re not up by the time I’m done, I’m eating your food.”

“Soul!”

Deliberately or not, as he pulled the door shut behind him, he turned just enough for her to catch a glimpse of the grin on his face. Then he was gone, and she was alone, sat up in her bed, blankets in a heap on her lap.

Oh, Soul, she thought.

The memory of a careful hand pushing her bangs away from her eyes came back to her as she ran her fingers through her hair. That was an uncharacteristic display of tenderness; so, too, was all of last night, and that morning. The conversation they had just then—that was how Soul showed her he cared. That was the kind of affection she was used to. He was not one to speak softly, or touch gently, but he had anyway.

Maka pulled her knees up to her chest, staring thoughtfully at the door. There were a hundred different thoughts swirling around inside her head, and not the least of which was the question of how she was going to tell him. She had to; she knew that. She made a promise to herself that in the morning, once she could trust herself not to burst into tears at the thought, she would tell him what it was that woke her up in the dead of night. It was difficult, though, to put into words.

It was a nightmare; he knew that already. A nightmare about what? Italy, she thought. It mirrored the events in the old cathedral almost perfectly. There was more to it than that, though. There was something else—something buried under the dark; under the sickening smell of blood; under the fear of being gutted by the same sword that had nearly taken her partner from her.

That was it.

It was not a nightmare about Italy; it was a nightmare about losing Soul, and somehow, she had to tell him that.

Swallowing around the lump in her throat, Maka forced herself up and out of bed. A shower—and a cold one at that—would do her good before facing what was about to come.

Breakfast awaited her on the table when she was finished. It was burnt; she could tell straight away from the smell hanging in the air. On any other day, she might have scolded Soul for overcooking their food, but this morning, after the night she had, all she could do was smile to herself.

Soul sat on his side of the table, waiting for her. He called no attention to the sad state of the blackened French toast that lay in front of her, and, to his surprise, neither did she. All she said was: “Thanks for breakfast.”

“Uh…you’re welcome,” said Soul.

The confusion—and relief—in his voice soothed the hollow feeling that had made a home inside her belly. She might have laughed had she been feeling more like herself. At the moment, though, all she felt was a heavy, sobering sense of reality.

Soul frowned at her, and it was then she realized she had yet to look away from him. Her mouth popped open, then quickly closed again, and she looked down at her lap, embarrassed.

A beat of silence passed before Soul asked, “Are you good?”

To which she said, “I’m not sure.”

Maka fidgeted with her hands. She could feel Soul’s eyes on her, expectant and full of questions he did not know how to ask.

“I’m sorry,” she said unprompted. At that, Soul opened his mouth, she presumed, so that he could tell her not to apologize, but she did not give him a chance to speak. “Last night,” she went on, “I just didn’t want to think about it. I should’ve told you, but I didn’t want you to worry, or…"

“Maka,” Soul said firmly. The sound of her name pulled her gaze up from her lap. “I don’t want you to say ‘sorry.’ I want you to tell me what’s wrong.”

One last time, she hesitated, feeling the words thick on the back of her tongue. It was a suffocating feeling, and it reminded her all too much of how she felt inside the cold, dark room, struggling to breathe through the panic that clogged her throat. She swallowed dryly at the memory, and then, gathering her courage, drew in a deep breath.

“I had a dream about you.”

Soul’s face fell. “About me?”

“Yeah. About…”

A quick glance down at his chest was all it took. Something in his eyes changed. Maka could not quite place what it was, but it was as if the spark behind them had suddenly gone out. And then, when he said, “Oh,” she knew that he knew, and everything inside her went crashing down, down, down.

Soul looked like he wanted to say something. The impassive facade he wore faltered as he tried to find the words to…comfort her, she supposed, but there was nothing he could have said that would have lessened the hurt.

“I guess it still scares me,” said Maka.

“What does?”

“That it could happen again.”

“If it does…” Soul started, but trailed off, looking at her with pensive eyes. Maka held her breath. She had no idea what she wanted him to say; what would have eased her fear, or made her feel less hollow inside, but she wanted something, and she wanted it more desperately than she had ever wanted anything before.

What he did say only managed to further break her heart.

“If it does, it’s okay. I told you before: I’m ready to die for my meister.”

He said it as if it were the easiest thing in the world.

She shook her head, and, at length, told him: “That’s not it.”

“Then what is it?”

“What do you mean, ‘what is it?’”

“I mean—look, I’m telling you, it’s okay.” Again, it came so easily, like second nature; like he didn’t even have to think about it. “You don’t have to worry about me. It’s my—”

“That’s not it!” The words boiled out of her with an intensity that surprised even her. Something swelled inside the great, gaping hole in her stomach, sweeping up through her chest and past her lips before she could bite it back. “You can’t just say ‘it’s okay!’ It’s not okay! What am I supposed to do without you?”

Soul’s eyes widened, and he straightened up in his chair.

“You’re my best friend!” shouted Maka. Her voice broke halfway through, and she felt unwelcome tears starting to well up in her eyes. Her chest tightened around her pounding heart, making it hard to breathe. “Why do you get to decide it’s fine to—to leave me here alone?” The words came out in short bursts between shallow breaths. “Why don’t I get a say?”

As tears started to pour down her cheeks, she bit the corners of her mouth to stop her lips from quivering. The hard stare she leveled at Soul never wavered, even as her hands, balled up into fists in her lap, began to tremble, and her heart felt as if it might beat through her chest.

Soul had nothing to say. There was nothing he could have said. He could have promised her he would never do it again, but that would have been a lie; one she never would have believed. Absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt, he would do it again, and that thought filled her veins with a cold burst of fear.

Sitting still was too much to bear. She had to move; get out; do something. Go back to her room. Sort herself out. This was going nowhere, and she was starting to feel sick.

She pushed her chair backward and, finally tearing her gaze away from Soul, stood up from the table. Her intention was to shut herself in her room, but no sooner had she turned to do so than she heard a loud clamor erupt behind her. All at once, several things happened: There was the loud, awful sound of metal scraping across tile, and then something heavy fell over, clanging against the floor as it went. Things on the table clattered noisily together as if something had knocked into the edge.

Maka was about to turn around. She thought she had already started, but it all blurred together. Next thing she knew, Soul’s body crashed so heavily into hers that she nearly fell over herself, and then, in the same motion, she was whirled around and crushed against his chest. Her breath hitched as her heart bounded up into her throat. One of Soul’s hands tangled into her hair, holding her head close to his collar; the other flattened against her back, between her shoulders. He held her so tightly that for a second, he lifted her heels up off the floor. Then he leaned forward, bowing his body down over hers and burying his face in her neck.

Everything was very, very still, save for the rise and fall of his chest against hers as he dragged in breath after ragged breath. He didn’t say a word; there was no need to. The way he held her, clinging desperately to her as if her body were a lifeline, said things to her she wasn’t sure he could have put into words. She responded in kind: silently, and with a hug.

She slipped her hands underneath his arms and around his waist, up to the backs of his shoulders, where she took fistfuls of his sweatshirt, holding on to him as steadfast as he did her.

Something in her—something that was many things all at once, twisting and swirling white-hot in her belly—started to melt. It happened slowly, but still, it happened. Her hands, balled up in Soul’s shirt, still shook, but less so now, and the tears in her eyes were starting to dry, though that could have been because she had none left to cry.

Maka swallowed thickly and breathed in deep the warm, familiar smell that came from Soul’s clothes.

“It won’t,” she said suddenly.

“What?”

“It won’t happen again.” She spoke slowly and clearly to keep the words in one piece. “I’m not gonna let it. I’m gonna get better. It won’t happen again—ever.”

“Hey.” Soul’s voice was a warm gush on her neck. “Don’t talk like that,” he said. “If we get better, we do it together. We’re a team, remember?”

She caught herself wishing it did not have to be that way. Soul was right; of course he was, but this should not have been his burden to bear. It was her fault that it happened, and it should have fallen on her to ensure it never happened again.

Soul gave her no time to linger on that thought. He lifted his head up to look at her, and then he said, “Whatever you wanna do, I got your back, but you’re not going anywhere without me, okay? Don’t leave me out of it.”

Maka bit down hard on the inside of her cheek.

“Okay?” Soul said again.

He was right; she kept telling herself that. Without him at her side, what could she have done? Nothing. The opposite was true, too. Neither of them could go anywhere—do anything—get better without the other. That was the meaning of a partnership between a meister and their weapon. That was what she agreed to when she took his hand for the first time: to go through everything together.

That was what they would do, then.

She would get better, and alongside her, so would Soul, until there was nothing in the world that could touch them.

Maka sniffled once, and then, pulling the scattered pieces of herself back together, she nodded. “Okay,” she said. “Together.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art for this chapter was made by @Bearmageddon, @alcruid, and @fuzzyfur455!


	2. Something Wicked

Darkness swallowed the edges of the room around him, giving it the illusion of fathomless depth, as if the light under which he sat illuminated only an infinitesimal part of wherever it was he now found himself. Soul was not bothered by it. Somehow, he felt as if he knew just where he was, even though he had no memory of how he came to be there. It was comforting in its familiarity. It felt like home.

Smooth music filled the air, keeping out the unknowable silence that slithered like a living creature under the cover of shadows. The song, like the room, was comforting in a way he could not place. It was one he had heard a hundred times before, but he could not recall its name. Did it have one?

Tension crawled up his spine. Try as he might, he could not remember.

“Soul,” came a voice from behind him. It was smooth, like the music, and familiar, too, but not in the same comforting way. Soul dug his fingers into the arms of his chair. “What an interesting turn of events,” it said. “I can’t say I expected it, but I am glad that it happened.”

Soul kept his gaze fixed forward, staring aimlessly into the darkness that stretched beyond the red room. Even so, behind the backs of his eyes, he could see a grin full of vicious teeth splitting apart a face made of leathery flesh. Closing his eyes did not make it go away.

“I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Oh,” said the voice, “but I do. Who knows? Getting it out in the open might do you some good.”

Soul knew better than to trust it—whatever it was.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“Now you’re lying to me.”

“Fuck you.”

Silence. Silence, and music, and then: “I’m just trying to help you.” The smile on the thing’s face stretched until Soul could no longer see the edges. “Both of you.”

Soul whirled around in his chair, the corners of his mouth twisting to show his teeth. “Don’t you talk about her,” he said, his voice low and gravelly like the growl of a cornered animal.

The grin he saw in his mind’s eye was gone when he turned around, replaced by a smile meant to placate. The thing raised its hands in a gesture of surrender and said, “Now, now. No need to get riled up. Don’t you know by now that I’m on your side?”

For a long time, neither of them said a word. Soul’s pulse tore through him; he could hear it in his ears, drowning out the sound of the gramophone beside him.

The creature went on: “We want the same thing, you and I.”

“No, we don’t.”

“Of course we do. I saw you, you know. I can see everything you do; hear everything you say. I even know what you’re thinking right now.”

“You’re wasting your breath.”

“You want to keep her safe,” it said.

“Shut up.”

“I can help you do that.”

“Shut up!”

“All you have to do is let me.”

• • • • •

Guilt, nightmares, and the taste of blood hung like a fog in the air that night, and so impenetrable was it that sleep could not seem to find its way to her. Maka lay awake in her bed while her mind twisted itself in knots, thinking of all the things that happened since the last time she laid down to sleep. The past twenty-four hours felt so much longer than that.

That afternoon, at her insistence, she and Soul left the apartment. She made a promise to him—and to herself—that together, they would get better, and it was a promise she was keen to realize.

She wanted to practice matching soul wavelengths. Soul was reluctant, to say the least. He was concerned that it would not go well; that she was too tired, and altogether too frazzled to lend herself to a resonance. Witch Hunter was, after all, a technique they had yet to master, even on the best of days. Once Maka set her mind to something, though, Soul knew there was nothing he could do to dissuade her, and so, without much of a struggle, he let her have her way.

Things went poorly.

No matter how she tried, she found she could not pull herself out of her own head, and, like Soul feared, it must have affected their resonance. There was some kind of block between them. Each time they succeeded in coaxing out Witch Hunter, it would blow up in her face shortly thereafter, ripping Soul from her hands and hurling them both to the ground.

Maka was undeterred, though. After each attempt, she would say, “One more try,” and Soul would pick himself up, dust himself off, and come back to her for another go. She knew just what she was doing wrong, and she was convinced that if they kept at it, she would eventually get it right. Being able to see the problem while, at the same time, being unable to fix it left her frustrated, and the more frustrated she became, the more determined she was to try again, and again, and again. So there they stayed, trying—and failing—until she was too tired to do anything more than lie sprawled on the ground, gasping for breath.

All the while, Soul remained patiently by her side. Every time she got back up, he got up with her, and when doing so started to become a struggle, he came to offer her his hand. Not once did he suggest they give up, even when, after hours of trying, they still had yet to succeed. It was Maka who finally said, “Let’s go home,” and without a word, Soul followed her.

During the long walk through the city, he kept looking at her out of the corner of his eye. When she turned to meet his gaze, he looked away. If there was something he wanted to say to her, he never did.

Both of them went to bed early that night.

Maka was exhausted in every sense of the word. All she wanted was to sleep, but sleep would not come to her. For a long time—and she had no idea just how long—she lay alone in the dark, smothered in silence, thinking of inky black rooms, and old churches, and shadows that moved, breathed, and touched with their cold, twisted fingers. Most of all, though, she thought of Witch Hunter, red-hot in her hands, and how dazzlingly bright it was in the moment before it shattered.

She wished she could have held on to it—held on to Soul—just a little bit longer. She felt as if she let him down again.

He was not upset with her; she knew that. She was upset with herself. She was Maka Albarn. She was supposed to be a peerless scythemeister; the best there had ever been, and she still could not do this one simple thing. She could not match wavelengths with her partner.

If something happened—if they were backed into a corner with Witch Hunter as their last ditch hope—then what? It absolutely could not fail.

Maka absolutely could not fail.

Today, though, she had given all that she had, and it was still not enough. Witch Hunter had still failed. She had still failed. And it was that thought—along with the nightmares that loomed cold and shapeless in the back of her mind—that kept her awake.

With a heavy sigh, she tossed herself onto her side, tugging the blankets up around her neck, and tried again to think of something—anything else. She tried to think of the night before; of what soothed her back to sleep the last time sleep felt impossible: Soul.

Forgetting the day that had passed, she let herself live in the morning that preceded, when Soul was still there next to her. In her head, she counted imaginary heartbeats; remembered the warmth of his body curled up close to hers, and the feeling of his breath on her skin. She thought of gentle fingers in her hair, and an embrace that held her through the night, wanting to shelter her from whatever it was that frightened her.

Something stirred inside the empty hole in her stomach. It was a familiar feeling—or, rather, many, none of which she could quite place, but she found it oddly comforting nonetheless. Maka pressed her cheek tighter against her pillow. Finally, she could feel herself beginning to drift off.

There was something in her—a small, meek thing—that wanted to struggle against the sleep. It was afraid of what might lie behind her eyelids that night. It was afraid of seeing Soul there; of hearing his voice calling out for her, and feeling the cold, creeping fingers on her skin. Maka was more than the meek thing inside her, though. As much as she feared another nightmare, she was more afraid of how she would suffer in the waking world if she let such an inconsequential thing keep her from the rest she so sorely needed. Today had been a failure. If there was any hope of tomorrow being better, she would need to face it clear-headed and well-rested.

She tried not to think of silly things like bad dreams, and let thoughts of Soul lull her to sleep.

It was peaceful for a while. Then, faintly, in the quiet of what had been a deep, dreamless sleep, she found she could hear his breathing, and the heartbeats she had been counting like sheep a moment earlier. Had it been a moment? She could not remember, nor could she recall where she left off.

Things were fuzzy, and somehow, she felt as if something was not quite right. But that could not have been so.

Soul must have felt her stir. In the dark, he searched for her hand, and when he found it, he gave it a reassuring squeeze. Then he murmured, “You okay, Maka?”

By way of an answer, Maka pulled his hand close to her chest and held it tightly. His breath on the back of her neck reaffirmed his presence next to her, keeping her at ease until, seemingly from nowhere, the taste of copper dropped onto the back of her tongue.

Maka opened her eyes. All around her, it was dark—too dark to see anything. The blackness felt cold, and somehow, heavy. It bore down upon her, frightening her, and, tightening her hold on Soul’s hand, she pressed back into his chest.

Behind her, she felt his body shudder.

Maka was up in an instant. She slipped out from under the arm that, like the dark, had become a dead weight on top of her, and then she scrambled upright onto her knees. Soul did not react. Just moments before, he had been awake. He had spoken to her. But now, he looked as if he were asleep. He was motionless, and his eyes were closed.

“Soul?” She felt his name leave her lips, but could not hear herself say it.

With a cough, blood came oozing out from the corner of his open mouth.

She realized then that there was blood all around her. How had she not seen it before? How had she not tasted it?

How had she not felt it soaking through her clothes?

It poured from an open gash down the middle of Soul’s chest, and it pooled underneath him despite there being no floor. Beneath him—beneath both of them was a yawning black abyss, and no sooner had Maka realized this than she felt herself falling. The world around her surged upward while she sat on her heels, staring back at herself, her face, pale and wide-eyed, reflected in the sea of blood at her knees.

Cold crept over her, grazing its dark fingers along her skin before, all at once, it took hold of her, ensnaring her so suddenly and so violently that she felt a scream swell inside her chest. It was snuffed out, though, when her throat, along with the rest of her, was crushed. The darkness moved around her, undulating like the coils of a snake, and with each breath she took, she felt its hold tighten.

Soul’s body trembled with a shallow breath, and then a small sound fought its way out of him. He tried to speak, but the words drowned in the blood that gushed from his throat. Maka did not have to hear him to know what it was he wanted to say.

“You okay, Maka?”

Those three words seemed to swirl around her, slowly at first, then quicker and louder, until his voice began to smother itself.

Then, as the cacophony of noise hit a crescendo, the glass floor fell out from underneath her.

She awoke in a whirlwind of motion, still feeling the sensation of falling even as she lay safely in her bed. When she drew a breath, she did so as if she had been drowning. Her lungs burned, and she could feel the frantic beating of her heart in the back of her throat.

The scream she had been holding in escaped her in a breathless yelp.

Scrambling out from under her blankets, Maka looked around her, at first seeing only the same darkness she had been falling into a moment ago, but then, she became aware of a faint light next to her. It was coming from her window, squeezing in through her drawn curtains. It was the light of the sleeping city outside, and the yellow moon that hung up above.

Maka’s breathing began to quiet as she realized for the second time in as many nights that she was still in her room, and that she had been asleep. What she saw was just another dream.

For a few long seconds, she sat there motionless, pressed into the corner between her wall and the headboard of her bed. Then she curled up, hugging her knees with trembling hands. It still felt as if the darkness around her were alive somehow, biding its time, waiting. Maka knew that was ridiculous. Shadows did not lunge like snakes at the heels of girls who wandered out of bed at night. Nevertheless, though, when at last she did gather enough courage to leave the safety of her bed, she scampered quickly across her room and out the door, as if something might give chase.

Nothing did. Living darkness did not creep along the floor after her as she crossed the kitchen, nor did it bite at her ankles while she stood still on the outside of Soul’s bedroom door.

She stood there for what felt like a very long time, chewing on the inside of her lip, wondering: Should she knock? Should she go inside quietly, lay on top of the covers, and hope he did not notice her there till morning came? Or should she turn around and hope that she could sleep again in her own bed?

There was no way; she knew that already, and another sleepless night would do her no good at all.

Gathering herself together, she rapped the backs of her fingers against his door. Then she waited. No response. She tried again, louder, and then, from the other side, she heard the faintest movement. Hope flickered like candlelight in her chest.

“Soul?” she called softly.

There was no reply.

Slowly, Maka pushed open the door.

Peeking inside, she found the room dark, and Soul still in bed. He was on his back, tangled up in blankets and sheets with his pillow next to him, not underneath. He did not lift his head, nor did he look at her when she came in. His eyes were still closed—and very, very tightly at that.

She shut the door behind her with a soft _click_. “Soul,” she whispered, “it’s me.”

When she spoke, a weak groan tumbled from his parted lips.

“Soul?”

No response.

Maka’s heart sank.

“Oh, no,” she murmured. “Not you, too.”

No, no, no. Of all the things that could have gone wrong—anything but that.

The last time Soul had a nightmare, he awoke from a dead sleep, screaming. Maka had never seen him so terrified. His eyes, vacant and far away, looked straight through her. Wherever he was, he could not seem to hear her, either; even as she begged for him to wake up, all he did was scream, and scream, and scream.

It took both of her hands to pin down one of his. At first, he struggled, but she held fast, afraid that if she let go, he would rip the tubes out of his arm. When he started to calm down, though—when his screams died down to whimpers and the life flooded back into his eyes—he squeezed her hand so tightly the tips of his fingers went white.

Her stomach twisted, recoiling at the memory. She never, ever wanted to see him like that again.

“You’re okay,” she said, sitting down on the edge of the bed next to him. “It’s just a dream.”

Soul’s breath caught halfway down his throat. His eyelids twitched, and, strangely, so did his fingers, curling as if trying to close around something she could not see. Then he rolled his head toward her, murmuring something under his breath; something that almost sounded like…

“Maka.”

Her heart leaped into the bottom of her throat.

“Soul?” she said quickly. “Can you hear me?”

If he could, she hoped that her presence—her voice—would be of some comfort to him, but to her dismay, the more she talked to him, the more distressed he became. He rolled his head from side to side, whimpering, making soft noises that still, to her, sounded like her name.

“Come on, Soul.” She tried to keep the desperation from seeping into her voice. “Open your eyes. I’m right here.”

She took his hand then, and as soon as she did, he squeezed it—much tighter than she expected he would. That was when his eyes snapped open. Her name left his lips in a breathless gasp, and he went scrambling backward up the headboard, startling Maka so thoroughly that she, too, scrambled back.

At once, she hated herself.

Soul needed her. What was she doing?

“It’s okay!” she cried, reaching into the space between them. She resisted the urge to touch him, though. He was not looking at her; his eyes were far away, like they had been last time he woke up from a bad dream. She was not sure whether he knew she was there, and the last thing she wanted was to frighten him more than he was already.

His eyes, wide and full of fear, darted around wildly, seeming to see nothing at all. His chest heaved with a few deep breaths, and one of his hands reached up, trembling, to hover in front of his throat.

The time it took for him to come back to her felt like a small eternity. The same helplessness she felt last time—when all she could do was hold his hand—weighed just as heavily on her now; heavier, even, remembering how much of a comfort he had been to her just the night before. The only thing she could think to do was sit there, shushing him, and wish that she could do more.

After a few long seconds, his breathing began to slow, and the fog lifted from his eyes. He found her in the darkness, and when he looked at her, his breath hitched.

Maka leaned forward. “Soul?” she said, her voice scarcely more than a whisper.

Soul swallowed thickly. When at last he did speak, “Ma—” was all he could get out.

“You were dreaming,” she told him.

All was quiet for a moment, except for the sound of Soul’s ragged breathing. He still looked dazed. It hurt her heart to see him that way. She wanted to take it from him: the confusion, the fear, the nightmares. She wanted to make it all go away, if only she knew how.

At length, for want of something better to say, she asked, “Are you okay?”

Soul nodded, wordlessly at first, and then, after a beat, he said, “Are you?”

“Me?”

“Yeah. Did I—” He swallowed again. The way he spoke, it sounded like his throat was very dry. “Did I wake you up?”

In spite of everything, Maka felt the beginnings of a smile on her lips. “Wake me up?” she said. “That’s what you’re worried about right now?”

“Did I?”

Oh, Soul.

Maka shook her head. “No. I, um…”

She thought about telling him that she was already awake; that she just happened to hear him talking in his sleep and wanted to make sure he was okay. That would have been a lie, though. Maka hated it when Soul lied to her.

Her smile fell. So did her eyes. Glancing down at her hands, fingers tangled in the sheets underneath her, she admitted, half to herself: “I had one, too.”

“Aw, Maka…”

With a heavy sigh, Soul straightened himself up. He swayed forward, dizzy, maybe, and then he reached a hand out toward her. “C’mere,” he said, easy as anything, as if she couldn’t see his fingers quivering.

Something swelled underneath her heart. It was the same feeling—or feelings, rather—from before. She still did not know what it was, and she quickly decided it did not matter. What mattered to her now, more than anything, was being close to Soul.

Maka pulled her legs up over the edge of the bed and, crawling over the mess of blankets and sheets between them, she went to his side. With one arm—the one he held outstretched for her—he pulled her close, while the other, behind him, kept him upright. Maka hugged him carefully around the chest, and then, closing her eyes, let her head drop into the crook of his neck.

His hand, still shaking, flattened against her back, and he held her tight—too tight. She heard—and felt—a slow, unsteady breath, punctuated by the rapid beating of his heart under her cheek. She thought that by now, it would have slowed down. It had not.

“Same as last time?” asked Soul.

Maka nodded into his shoulder. Soul leaned his head sideways to rest on top of hers.

“You okay?” he asked, and she realized then that she had not answered him the first time.

Maka thought for a moment. Was she okay? She was not scared; at least, not in the same way she had been before. The dream that woke her did not feel so real anymore. A nightmare, at least, no matter how frightening it was, ended, and when it was over, she could tell herself it was nothing more than a dream. She was not dreaming now, though. The way Soul trembled underneath her was very, very real, and it hurt her in a way no nightmare ever could.

“If you are,” she said. It was the closest thing to the truth.

Soul sighed. She felt it on the top of her head. Then, quietly, he told her: “Let go a second.” The words slurred together, and it took her a moment to understand what he meant. It clicked for her when he started to lean backward. Keeping one hand behind him, he slowly laid back, and, reluctantly, Maka let him go.

At first, she was confused—disappointed, even—until she realized he was not letting go of her. One arm still around her, he pulled her gently down with him. For some reason, her heart skipped a beat. She paid it no attention; she was too preoccupied making sure she did not hurt him on the way down. Keeping her weight on her elbow, she settled onto her side, tucked tightly underneath Soul’s arm.

It was then she realized there was nowhere for hers to go but across his chest. She hesitated, trying very hard not to see what she knew was there.

Soul’s eyes flickered away from hers, down to the hand that hovered awkwardly above him. One corner of his mouth lifted into a crooked smile, and then he reached for her. Holding her breath, she watched him take her hand in his—then looked quickly away when he pressed it flat against his chest. Chills crawled underneath her skin when her fingers grazed staples. Her stomach dropped like a stone, and she had to overcome the urge to wrench her hand away.

Soul’s voice seemed impossibly far away when he asked her: “What’s that?”

It took her a moment to realize he had said anything at all. When she did, she looked up, startled, and said, “What?”

“What d’you feel?”

Maka was not sure she understood, until Soul tapped his thumb against the tops of her fingers, once, twice, in rhythm with…

“Your heartbeat.”

“Yeah,” said Soul. “See? I’m fine.”

Not for one second did she believe him, but hearing him say it did bring her some hollow sense of comfort. It was fleeting, though, and in its absence came guilt. She did not want him to comfort her. She did not want him to set aside his own feelings for her sake. She wanted him to trust that he could tell her what was wrong—what it was that scared him so badly. She wanted him to know that she would be okay if he did; that it would not break her like he thought it would. He did not have to treat her like such a fragile thing. He could lean on her. She could take it.

All evidence to the contrary, she thought bitterly. She expected him to believe that after she had cried and screamed and fallen to pieces in front of him. Not likely.

Maka sucked her lower lip between her teeth.

Soul’s smile started to falter. He searched her eyes, looking for something—what to do, she supposed, to make her feel better. She wanted to tell him not to worry about her, but then she would have sounded an awful lot like him.

Stupid, stubborn boy.

“You’re not fine,” she said.

Soul frowned at her. He looked like he was about to say something—argue, she expected—but she did not give him the chance. “I know you’re worried about me,” she went on, “and you know I’m worried about you, too. And I know you don’t want me to be, but it’s not that easy.”

“It’s just bad dreams,” said Soul.

“Twice.”

Maka still had no idea what he dreamt about the first time, in his hospital bed. He never told her. When she asked, he acted the same as he was now: He told her not to worry, and that he was fine. She almost believed him, too. A near-death experience, she supposed, would surely give someone nightmares. Now it had happened again, though, and this time, he said her name.

Nightmares about the old cathedral and the Demon Sword—Maka could have suffered through those, frightening as they may have been. What scared her the most was the stark reminder that she had almost lost her best friend that night. It was Soul’s voice, and the smell of his blood, and the sound of his body hitting the floor that she could not take.

What if it had been the same for Soul?

What if he dreamed of losing her, too?

That was just the kind of thing he would want to keep from her.

“Look,” said Maka, “you can tell me anything. You know that, right? Whatever it is—”

“It’s nothing.”

Maka tightened her lips into a frown. She still did not believe him. If she pressed, though, he would just keep telling her the same old thing: He was fine. He would have run her in circles all night if she was willing to chase him. She was not. She was tired, and so was he. There would be time to talk in the morning. Maybe he would come around then.

At length, she relented, telling him: “It better be nothing. If something was wrong with you, and you didn’t tell me—”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Soul assured her. “You saw all the pills they got me on. It’s fuckin’ with my head, that’s all.”

“You think that’s it?”

There was that easy smile again. “Yeah,” said Soul.

He moved to rub his thumb across her knuckles, but only made it halfway before Maka stole her hand out from under his. Soul looked up at her, and she saw something flash across his eyes: something she had seen there before. It was the same look he gave her when she caught him tucking her hair behind her ear. He looked at her like he had done something wrong.

Maka pretended not to notice. “At least tell me what it was about,” she said. Then, sprawling her arm across his chest, she laid her head down where her hand had been a moment ago: over top of his beating heart, listening to it thump noisily against her cheek.

Maka counted one, two, three beats before Soul seemed to remember how to breathe.

“What was what?” he said.

“Your dream,” said Maka. “I heard you saying my name. Were you looking for me?”

Normally, Soul was a good liar. He was well-practiced. This time, though, when he said, “I don’t remember,” it came out shaky, like he didn’t believe it himself.

Maka had to bite her tongue to keep from pressing him any further; leading herself around in circles.

“Well, I’m here now,” she said, and closed her eyes. “You can go back to sleep if you want to. I’m not going anywhere.”

Soul hesitated to say, “I dunno.”

“Try,” said Maka. “Please.”

One heartbeat. Two heartbeats.

Soul rested a hand on her arm, above her elbow, and gave it a soft squeeze. “You, too,” he said.

Maka nodded into his chest.

It took a long time for either of them to fall asleep. All the while, Soul stayed very, very quiet. Were it not for the steady movement of his thumb up and down her arm, she would not have known he was awake at all.

However long it took for him to drift off, Maka was still awake when it happened. She felt his hold on her beginning to loosen. Finally, his arm slid off her waist and hit the mattress behind her. The rise and fall of his chest slowed, and his breathing grew shallow. She kept on listening to his heartbeat. Once he was asleep, she expected that it would slow, but it did not.

It did begin to rise in pitch, though. Maka thought nothing of it. She was tired; her eyes were heavy, stinging from the bright fluorescent light above her. She tried to blink, but found that somehow, her eyes were already closed. How was it, then, that she could see the light?

Suddenly, everything was very white. The lights up above were white, and so were the walls, and the cold tile floor below. White were the thin blankets on top of Soul, and Maka’s fingers as she pressed her nails into her palms, and her palms into her knees.

Soul was asleep. He had been asleep for a while now. It made the room in which she sat feel very empty. The stale air was filled only by the steady beeping of the heart monitor, and the hushed voices of people in the hall, talking to one another in a language Maka did not understand.

Everything was so extraordinarily vivid. It was like living inside of a memory. She supposed that was what it was.

It was a dream. That realization was a quiet, gentle one; it did not frighten her. This dream did not feel like the others. It was cold, and it was silent, but there was no menace dwelling beneath the shadows in the corners of the room. There were no shapeless hands waiting to pull her through the floor, into the hungry abyss below.

It was a dream of a hospital room: one she had been inside before, and knew very well. It was a dream of Italy, and Soul, and bitter though it may have been, it was only a memory.

Soul looked just like he had that night. He was so pale, like a ghost of himself.

Without thinking, she leaned forward, reaching for his hand. Then she took it between both of hers and lifted it to her cheek, leaning her head against the backs of his fingers. Soul did not stir. He was going to sleep for a very long time. She remembered that. All she wanted—more than she had ever wanted anything—was to see him open his eyes, but he was so tired. He would sleep all night, into the next morning, and there by his side she would stay, waiting.

Worrying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art in this chapter was made by @alcruid and @Bearmageddon!


	3. What Goes Up...

When other students asked why neither Soul nor Maka had come to school the day prior, Soul took the fall. He lied straight to their friends’ faces, telling them: “I wasn’t feelin’ great, so she”—he pointed with his thumb toward Maka—“let me stay home.”

There was no reason not to believe him. It was easier than telling the truth, but something about it still felt wrong.

Every time, they would ask if he was feeling better today, and every time, he would say, “Yeah. I’m fine.”

Always fine.

Maka wished it were so easy for her to say the same.

Standing out in the hallway, staring up at the board of available assignments, she found her eyes passing over the words without truly reading.

Some were from the States: Arkansas and Rhode Island. There was one down in Nicaragua, too, and one in Bolivia. The one from Finland had been there since the beginning of last week. She remembered seeing it before leaving for Italy. Looking at it put a knot in the bottom of her belly.

Soul, ever by her side, watched her for some time without saying a word. All day, he had been quiet. So had she. Much like yesterday, she was tired, despondent, and lost inside of her own head. That morning and much of the afternoon passed by in a haze. She sat at her desk without feeling like she was really there. She kept her pencil in hand, but she took no notes. Her eyes were on the professor, but all throughout the lecture, she did not hear a word he said.

Her thoughts kept wandering back to Soul.

Like her, he was exhausted. There were dark circles under his eyes, and he kept yawning into his sleeve. Still, he followed her to school without complaint. She supposed it was for the same reason he had not complained yesterday during practice: He knew that this was something she needed to do. He was right. If she had stayed home another day, the restlessness would have driven her out of her mind. She needed to feel like she was doing something.

School had not helped like she hoped it would, though. She thought she would feel better after a day spent in class—that she would find some kind of inspiration, or a different angle to approach her resonance with Soul—but now that it was over, all she felt was tired. It was the deep kind of tired: the kind that lived in her bones and made her feel heavy all over.

Soul reached in front of her and pulled one of the cards forward. Maka startled at the sudden movement, realizing again, to her frustration, that her mind had been elsewhere.

“This one?” offered Soul.

Blinking, Maka looked it over. It was the one from Arkansas, asking for an investigation into a string of hikers that had been slaughtered in the Ozarks.

“It’s not that far,” Soul said. “We could be there and back in a couple days.”

Maka tightened her hands around the strap of her bag. She could feel Soul looking at her out of the corner of his eye, waiting for her to say something.

It was her idea to come look at the board. She was not sure what she expected to find, or how it was supposed to make her feel. She knew deep down that she was not ready to go chasing monsters again. Neither was Soul. He was willing to follow her, though, if that was what she wanted. Maka was confused as to whether she should feel grateful for his loyalty or disappointed in his complete lack of concern for his own well-being.

At length, she said, “I don’t know.”

One corner of Soul’s mouth curled up into a tired half-smile. He let the card fall. Its wooden backing clinked against the board. Then he shoved his hand back into the pocket of his pullover.

“You wanna think about it?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

Both of them knew she had no intention of doing so. Nevertheless, Soul gave her a nod, acting, for her sake, like he believed her. “Okay,” he said. “Whenever.”

Maka swallowed dryly. She wished she could tell him when that would be. When the wound healed, she supposed. When it healed, and the staples were out, and those wounds healed, too; then she would come and look at the board again and see if it made her feel just as sick.

Maybe that was why she wanted to look in the first place: to see if she could face it. She was disappointed, then, to realize she could not.

That thought was quickly laid to rest by the sound of a long, loud yawn beside her. Maka turned to Soul in time to see him loll his head back, mouth open wide and eyes closed tight. Tears pooled in the corners. Maka smiled to herself, a bittersweet feeling settling comfortably into the bottom of her chest.

“Hey,” she said, “that’s enough of that. Go home, you.”

Soul blinked sleepily at her. “Me?”

“Yeah, you, dummy.” Maka elbowed him gently in the arm, and Soul jerked it away. “I’ll be there soon,” she said. “I want to look around the library first; see if I can find something to keep me busy over the weekend.”

Soul lifted an eyebrow and asked, “You don’t want me to come with?”

Maka’s smile broadened. “I think I can do it on my own,” she said. “You need to go get some rest.”

Soul gave her a long, lingering look, like there was something else he wanted to say. He hesitated, though, and it made Maka wonder: Did he not believe her? There was no reason for him not to. It was the truth, and it was not that unusual, either, for her to stop by the library after school.

No, it was definitely not that. In his eyes, Maka found that same something he kept trying to hide from her.

The concern he did not want to show.

“Hey,” she said, softening her smile. “What’s the matter?”

Soul looked taken aback. “What?”

“You. You’re looking at me funny.”

“I’m not looking at you any kinda way,” said Soul, throwing his gaze down the opposite end of the hall.

“I can go to the library by myself.”

The way he said, “I know,” it was like she had just told him the sky was blue.

Maka leaned forward, and reluctantly, Soul looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “Are you okay being home alone?” she asked.

“Yeah?” It came across as a question. Maka was not sure how to answer.

“Then what is it?” she said.

“Nothing. I’m fine.”

There were those two little words again. Maka’s smile flopped upside down.

“Just…” Soul started, but trailed off before he could finish his thought. When he spoke again, Maka could tell it was not what he wanted to say. “Just don’t take too long,” he said. “You need some rest, too, you know.”

The last part was tacked on begrudgingly, like he was afraid he might give off the impression of caring. That was her Soul.

“I know,” she said. “I’ll be quick.”

He still seemed reluctant—and Maka still did not know why—but exhaustion must have won him over in the end. After a long silence, he finally said, “Okay,” and the two of them went their separate ways.

Truthfully, Maka did not want to go to the library at all, much less on her own. It was just another thing she needed to do. She needed to come to school to avoid losing her mind, and over the next two days, she would need something to keep her similarly occupied. She could not sit around for an entire weekend feeling as if she were doing absolutely nothing; not after she promised Soul that they were going to get better, and especially not after the failure that was yesterday.

She was not going to get better by resting.

Then she caught herself.

Maka blinked her eyes and shook her head. No, that kind of thinking would get her nowhere. Soul was right: She needed to rest, too, and she could not let her impatience get in the way of that. Burning herself out would only make things worse.

She would rest. But first, the library.

She spent a long time scouring the shelves, finding, as she expected, no lack of books to choose from. The issue quickly became how many she could fit inside her school bag.

All of them had something or other to do with soul wavelengths. Maka hoped that one of them would be able to tell her something she did not already know.

It was dusk by the time she left. She lost track of exactly how much time she spent stuffing her bag full of books. That had nothing to do with the fog inside her head, though; that was what always happened when Maka went to the library.

Not that the fog had lifted. If anything, it worsened during the walk home. She took her time, hoping the fresh evening air would do her some good. It did, she supposed. It was the quiet that got to her; the melancholy of walking down lonely streets while a gray, starless sky loomed overhead.

It was a relief to be home.

Pushing open the apartment door, Maka was about to call out for Soul—tell him she was home, and ask him what he wanted to have for dinner—but no sooner had she opened her mouth to do so than she popped it shut again, freezing where she stood.

There on the sofa, silhouetted in the harsh, flickering light of a muted television, was Soul. He was lying with his head on his arm, still dressed in his clothes from earlier. His eyes were shut, and his mouth hung open just enough to let a dark patch of drool soak into his sleeve.

Soul, who Maka had always known to be a light sleeper, did not so much as stir when she came in. That was odd, and for a second, worrisome. The memory of last night was still fresh in her mind, and it was not one she was keen to relive.

She held her breath as she watched Soul’s sleeping face, expecting to see his eyelids twitch, or the corners of his mouth to dip into a frown. She waited for a whimper to pass his lips, but he was quiet. He did not move, nor make a sound.

Thank goodness, thought Maka.

She shut the front door as quietly as she could, wincing at the click of the lock as it slid into place. Soul still did not stir. He must have been exhausted. Maka smiled to herself, wondering idly if she should let him sleep. She thought about waking him. There was a part of her that wanted to sit beside him and tuck his hair behind his ear like he had done for her. She wanted to say, “Hey, sleepyhead,” and tell him to get himself into bed if he was so tired. He was going to put a kink in his neck sleeping that way.

But at least he was sleeping.

He was exhausted, and he was sleeping so deeply. A little soreness in the morning would be worth a good night’s rest, thought Maka.

So, careful not to make a sound, she slipped her shoes off at the door. Then she crossed the living room on her toes, picked up the remote from the coffee table, and shut off the television. The gray glow of dusk coming in through the crack in the curtains lit her way to her bedroom.

Once inside, she reached for her door, ready to shut it behind her. Then she paused, throwing one last glance Soul’s way.

He may have been sleeping soundly now, but…

Suppose he had another nightmare. Suppose he started mumbling her name in his sleep, looking for her. What if it was too quiet for her to hear through the wall? Better to leave the door open, just in case, if for nothing other than her own peace of mind.

So, with the door hanging ajar, Maka set to work unpacking the contents of her bag. She piled her new books in a stack on her windowsill, and picked out the one that seemed most promising. It was a thick hardback, indexed like an encyclopedia. Attached to it was one of those bookmarks made of ribbon, which she liked. It busied her fingers while she began poring over the pages, finding that, for the first time that day, she was able to focus on something.

• • • • •

Something black and viscous was dripping down the red velvet curtains. The record player beside him had begun to hiss and pop, distorting the song that was once so familiar. The needle kept skipping across the vinyl. Soul wanted to get up and fix it. He did not dare move from where he sat.

The little creature that lived inside the red room carried on as if nothing had changed. Soul tried not to see its wicked smile behind his eyelids; tried not to hear its shuffling footsteps dancing just out of sight, as if what had once been music were now anything more than discordant noise.

“Soul,” said the creature. The way his name slithered off its tongue made his skin prickle. “Good to see you again.”

“Leave me alone,” Soul said curtly, turning his eyes up and away from the red, leathery skin that flashed in his peripheral.

The thing snickered to itself. “Did it get cold in here?” it asked. “Or is it just me?”

Scratch. Hiss. Silence. The dancing footsteps stopped.

Soul watched a drop of sticky black ooze slide down toward the floor, deliberately avoiding the thing’s bulbous eyes. Its gaze bore into him, vying for his attention, but he would not turn and look. He did not need to, anyway, to see it looking back at him.

Its thin lips peeled back into a grin. Impossibly wide as it was, more disconcerting to Soul was that there seemed to be far too many teeth inside. “Alright,” it said. “Have your way. Don’t talk. Just listen.”

Soul tipped his chin into the air. “I’m not listening a fuckin’ word you say.”

“Oh, not me.”

Hiss. Pop.

Maka screamed his name so loudly it made his ears ring.

Cold blood gushed into Soul’s veins. He was up and on his feet before he knew what was happening. Her voice seemed to come from all around him. He turned, heart in his throat, looking for her, but all he saw was a blur of red velvet and sticky black ooze.

He had her name on the back of his tongue, about to call out for her, when suddenly—just as suddenly as the first time—she cried out: “Soul!”

It sounded the same as before. Exactly the same, almost as if...

Soul’s hands trembled at his sides. Slowly, his eyes wandered across the room to the gramophone. He watched the needle skip across the record. Maka’s voice came pouring out of the darkness that loomed behind the curtains. This time, it popped in the middle.

“You remember?” said the creature.

Soul could hear the smile in its voice; see it behind his eyes. Something inside of him started to boil.

“I know you do,” it went on. “I remember, too. I was—”

“Shut up!” shouted Soul. The record on the gramophone skipped once, twice, and then cut out altogether, leaving in its absence a silence that may have been deafening were it not smothered by the echo of his own pulse in his ears.

Lips pulled back to show his teeth, Soul rounded on the creature behind him. “Shut up!” he said again. “I had enough of you! I’m sick of you in my fuckin’ skin, thinking you can fuckin’—you can—”

There was something in his throat. It was warm and thick, and it stung the back of his tongue when it bubbled up into his mouth. He tried to spit it out, but it kept coming.

The thing grinned up at him, chewing on its fingers. It said nothing; just chittered and gnawed and gnashed its teeth, looking at him with eager eyes.

“Just leave me alone!” Droplets of black flew from his lips as he struggled to speak. “Fuck off!”

“You make it sound like such a bad thing,” said the creature, its words dripping with thinly-veiled malice. “Wouldn’t it be nice to never have to feel that way again?”

“Fuck you!”

“To never have to see her that way again?”

• • • • •

Hours ticked by. Maka spent those hours buried in her books; her pencils, too, and highlighters, and sets of colored sticky notes, organizing them inside the notebook that lay open at her side. She read until it ached, and then read some more.

She must not have noticed her eyes beginning to drift shut. One moment, she was reading, and the next, she was startled awake by the creaking of her bedroom door.

When she lifted her head, a sharp pain shot down the back of her neck. She grimaced, mumbling a curse under her breath. Somewhere on the fringes of her consciousness, she remembered wanting to berate Soul for falling asleep in such an awkward position.

Oh, right. Soul.

That was his voice asking her what she was doing.

She tried to ask, “What?” All that came out was a moan.

“You know what time it is?” said Soul.

“I have no idea,” slurred Maka.

The dull light of her bedside lamp stung her eyes when she opened them. She blinked, dragging her gaze across the room to her doorway. Soul stood there, leaning on his shoulder, hair a mess and face screwed up in confusion. “It’s the middle of the night,” he said.

Maka reached up to rub the sleep from her eyes. “I was afraid you’d say that.”

“What’re you doing up still?”

“Reading.”

“Yeah. I can see that.” Soul glanced down at the book in her lap, then looked back to her. “What you got there?” he asked.

“Books.”

“You’re somethin’ else.”

Maka cracked a smile. So did Soul.

He pushed lazily off the doorframe, swaying at first as if he might topple over, then shuffled his way across the room to her bedside. He fell rather than sat down. Maka sank back into the pillow that kept her propped up. She tucked the ribbon between the pages of her book before closing it in her lap.

Soul’s eyes flickered across the cover. He frowned.

“What’s that?” he asked.

“What it says.”

“You’re still on this?”

Maka stared evasively down at her hands.

“It was one bad day,” said Soul.

“Yeah, well, I’m not gonna feel any better till I know I’ve got this figured out.”

Soul’s frown tightened at the corners. He was giving her that look again, like there was something he wanted to say to her. Knowing him, it would be something like: “Give it up and go to sleep. Your books aren’t going anywhere.”

Having prepared herself for that, she was surprised at the softness in his voice when he said, “You remember me saying something about doing this together, right?”

Maka opened her mouth to answer, but closed it again without a word. She was not sure what to say, except for: “You were asleep.”

“You could’ve woke me up.”

Reluctantly, Maka looked up at him, and let her lips curl into a wry smile. “Oh, that sounds familiar,” she said.

Soul stuck out his lip at her. “Don’t.”

“Where have I heard that before?”

Then he rolled his eyes. “Anyway,” he said, “I’m awake now. You gonna tell me what you found?”

“Not much,” Maka admitted. “At least, not yet. A lot of it I already knew.”

“What did you not?”

“Did you know playing chess is supposed to help?”

“Is it actually?”

“Yeah. It gets you into the other person’s head, or…something like that. Makes you think about what they’re thinking.”

“I don’t know how to play chess.”

Maka clicked her tongue. “Well.”

Soul laid back across the bed, one arm tucked behind his head, and asked, “What else you got?”

There was not much to tell. Much of what Maka knew, Soul knew, too. He listened, though; or pretended to listen, at least, as she rattled off what little she had learned. His eyes followed her while she leaned over, setting her book down on top of the pile on the windowsill, in between a pair of stuffed animals. Then, with a huff, she flopped onto the bed beside him.

“I don’t know what else we can do,” she said. “It’s not like we don’t know how to do it. There’s just something…” She reached her hand up toward the ceiling and closed her fingers. “I feel like it’s right there.”

“It’s gonna be fine,” Soul said easily.

Maka was starting to hate that word.

She rolled her head to the side, looking at Soul out of the corner of her eye. He did not look back; his eyes were closed. The dark circles were still there; she could see them in the faint yellow light of her bedside lamp. What little sleep he got must not have been enough. Still, there he was. He could have left her there and gone to bed, but he stayed.

A smile snuck unnoticed onto her lips. She only became aware of it when Soul opened his eyes. She realized then that she was staring, and, embarrassed, she looked away, feeling as if she had been caught doing something wrong.

“What?” said Soul.

“Nothing. I’m…” Her heart was in her throat, and she did not know why. “I’m gonna go over my notes again.”

With that, she reached for her notebook, lying open at her side, and hid her face between the pages. Soul watched her impassively, mumbling, “Cool.” Then he yawned. It was another one of those long, loud yawns that brought tears to the corners of his eyes. “Let me know if you find anything.”

“I will,” said Maka.

That was going to be hard, she thought, as her eyes passed over the words without reading a one.

• • • • •

Faint. Flickering. Frantic.

Icy tongues licked her heels as she crept through the inky blackness. So thick was the dark that she could not see her own hands in front of her.

Something was there with her. It was a small, struggling thing, twitching as if caught in a spider’s web. She could not see it—she could see nothing at all—but she could feel it somewhere deep down inside her. It tugged at the very core of her, beckoning her like a moth to a flame. There was something about it that drew her in; something about it that she needed, and something about it that needed her.

She wanted to go to it, but she did not know how. The longer she pressed through the endless dark, the further away it seemed. She wanted to call out to it—tell it to wait; that she would be there soon—but when she tried, something wet and thick rose in the back of her throat. She turned and coughed into her arm, feeling something warm splatter onto her skin.

Maka curled her lip in disgust. She tried not to think about what it could be.

“Hello?” she called into the pitch black. “Can you hear me?”

The thing did not answer her. How could it? Maka was not even sure what it was. Could it speak? If it did, would she have been able to hear? All she knew for certain was that she could feel it, and she supposed that would have to be enough to guide her.

At first, it was slow going, with small, careful steps. Maka kept her hands outstretched to the abyss, feeling nothing before her but cold, dead space. It’s all empty, she thought.

Then it moved.

Maka could feel it just as surely as the little, quivering thing, lost like she was in the nothingness. This thing, though—the dark, or what was alive inside of it—was not lost. It moved with purpose, lurking like a spider at the edge of its web, watching with innumerable, unblinking eyes as she tangled herself tighter in its snare.

For a moment, she froze. She did not blink, nor breathe.

Everything stilled.

The dark around her seemed to exhale.

She ran.

She ran for what felt like a very long time before she realized she was going nowhere at all. It was foolish to think she could outrun it; that she could reach what was calling out to her before the very darkness in which it was trapped. She had to try, though. She had the sense that if she were too late, it would be lost to her forever.

She needed to reach it before the spider swallowed it up.

The spider. She rolled those two words around inside her head, trying to distract herself from the feeling of its eyes on her back. That, she thought, seemed as fitting a name for it as any, given that she could not fathom what it truly was. All she knew of it was that it seemed to be infinite, formless, and ravenous.

It pursued her, but in a strange kind of way. If it wanted to have her, it could have lunged at any time, but it did not. It followed passively while she sought out the flicker of life in the dead dark. 

All around her, the abyss shifted, parting the way for her, then closing in behind her as she passed. Its cold breath ghosted across the backs of her shoulders. She told herself she did not feel it. Instead, she poured herself into the feeling that lived in her chest, underneath her heart.

If she closed her eyes and tried very hard, then for a moment, she could almost forget the fear bubbling in her blood. All around her, the stagnant air was bitterly cold, but the faint heartbeat that accompanied her own made her feel warm inside. Its presence was like a familiar embrace.

It felt safe. It felt like home.

It felt like…

Sickness rose in her stomach. Even as she tried to deny it, she was beginning to realize what it was.

“Soul?”

It was Maka’s voice, seeming to come from somewhere below him; beneath the red tile floor.

When he heard it, Soul tightened his fingers around the arms of his chair. He threw an uneasy glance at the gramophone beside him. It was still playing its smooth tune. The needle was not skipping today. The music was not distorted; it was the same song from before: the one he knew, but did not.

“Fuck off,” he mumbled.

The sharp-toothed creature, who had been snapping its long fingers to the rhythm of the music, paused at the intrusion. Then it made a low sound in its throat, like a hum that lilted up at the end, turning it into an unspoken question.

“You heard me,” said Soul.

“No, not you.”

Soul did not want to look behind him, but he did anyway. He turned around in his chair and fixed his gaze on the little parasite. It liked to be behind him, he noticed, and he wondered why…before deciding he ought not think about it.

“What d’you mean, ‘not me?’” he asked.

The creature did not answer him. It was staring intently down at the floor beneath Soul’s shoes. For once, it was not smiling.

“I’m talking to you,” said Soul.

Then it looked up at him.

“I’m not doing anything,” it said.

There was no reason for Soul to believe what it was saying. Whatever came out of its mouth, he should have believed the opposite, and he would have, were it not for the faint feeling that wriggled its way into the bottom of his chest. It was like a warm touch in the cold, and Soul knew exactly what it was.

Maka.

He held his breath, thinking that somehow, it had to be some kind of trick. The damned thing was toying with him. Its ignorance was a charade; it had to be. Maka could not be here. Wherever it was, it was not safe. It felt like the belly of a sleeping beast.

The creature must have smelled fear in the air, and, pleased, curled the corners of its mouth into a toothy smile. Then it said, “Well? Are you going to let her in?”

“That’s—” Soul started to speak, but all of a sudden, his tongue felt too thick to move.

That’s not her, he thought. Not her.

Not here.

“Soul?” called Maka. “Where are you?”

Yellow eyes glanced at the black door. Something predatory flashed through them. Before he knew what he was doing, Soul sprung up out of his chair, scrambling across the room to the door. Where it led, he did not know, and it did not matter. He flung himself into it.

Then he fell.

No sooner had he stepped over the threshold than the red room disappeared behind him, and he was swallowed whole by the dark. It was so cold, it took his breath away. He wanted to call out for her, but before he could fill his lungs, he heard her voice again. “Please talk to me,” she said, clearer now, but she still sounded so far away.

“Maka!” he cried, hoping against hope that she could hear him, too.

Her name echoed, spiraling down, down, down into the inky black, and Soul chased blindly after it, pushing aside the cold that undulated around him. It closed in, squeezing, sticking to his heels as he moved, but he ignored it. It could try all it wanted to keep him away from her. If he had to, he would tear his way through.

“Maka!”

“Soul!”

The faint glow she was chasing burned brighter now. It reached out, straining to touch her, and without thinking, she found herself reaching out, too, into the yielding dark. Behind her, above her head, the spider lurched like a marionette on twisted strings. It still did not touch her, but she could feel its breath down her back, urging her to move.

She could feel Soul, too. He was closer now than ever. All she had to do was reach a little further; move a little quicker, and then…

It vanished.

Soul vanished.

His heartbeat was gone. The warmth of his soul was gone, snuffed out by the cold.

She was too late.

Maka almost fell over herself. She froze where she stood, dragging in deep gulps of stale, frigid air. Her chest burned, and her hands trembled, and her throat closed tight as tears welled in her eyes.

She awoke with her fingers tangled in the front of Soul’s sweatshirt. She blinked sleepily, taking a moment to understand what she was seeing; why her vision was a swathe of maroon, and why she was so warm when she had been so cold.

An all too familiar realization settled over her. Bad dreams, she thought, and with a sigh, she closed her eyes again, pressing her forehead into the back of Soul’s shoulder.

Then he took her hand. Maka startled, and in her thick, sleepy voice, murmured, “Soul?”

He pressed her quivering fingers tighter against his chest. “Right here,” he said.

Slowly, Maka lifted her head up off the pillow, letting her chin drop onto Soul’s shoulder. When she looked down at him, he looked as if he were still asleep. Were it not for the way he stroked the back of her hand, she would have thought her mind was playing tricks on her.

“You’re awake,” she said softly.

“Uh-huh.”

“Did I wake you up?”

“Heard you calling me.”

Oh, no, thought Maka. Not again. Embarrassment lit up her cheeks. “Was I?”

“Not out loud.”

Maka’s breath stuttered in her throat. She felt her tired eyes pop open wide. “What did you say?” she asked. “What do you mean, ‘not out loud?’”

“Maka,” Soul said through a yawn, “go back to sleep.”

“Were we resonating?”

There was a long silence then. Maka wondered how Soul could be so calm. After all that time spent trying and failing, her soul managed to reach his—almost. They were so close. The thought made her so giddy that sleep had all but vanished from her mind. Excitement swelled where fear had been. She wanted to squirm; to move; to jump up and down; but Soul’s hand on hers kept her right where she was.

“Soul?” she prodded.

“Shut up,” grumbled Soul, ghosting his thumb across the backs of her fingers. “Go to sleep.”

“How am I supposed to sleep now?”

Soul heaved a long sigh, but did not answer her; just rubbed slow circles into her hand. Maybe, she thought, that was his way of answering.

She frowned.

Lazy, she thought, and let her head fall back down onto the pillow. Then she felt something underneath her: something hard pressing into the bottom of her ribs. Maka squirmed, arcing sideways off the bed, and when she scooted backward, the edge of her notebook emerged from underneath her.

Oh, right.

“What’re you doing?” asked Soul.

“Nothing,” said Maka. She shoved the notebook aside, crinkling the pages, and not caring. All those notes—all for nothing, and she didn’t care one bit.

It was foolish to worry so much. Soul was right: It was one bad day, and now it was over.

She thought everything was okay.

Why, then, did she continue to fail?

Why, after nights spent reading and days spent in a sleepless fog, did she fail again and again? That day, and the day that followed, and the night after that—all an exercise in utter failure.

She thought she was doing everything right, but no matter how she tried, she could not seem to reach Soul. There was still something in the way. Every time she felt Witch Hunter come alive in her hands, something pushed its way between them, and suddenly, it was all white light and burning pain and stars dancing in the dark around the edges of her vision.

Slowly, Maka peeled her aching body up off the ground. Hot tears welled up in her eyes.

How was it that she managed to do it so effortlessly in her sleep? The one time she had been able to successfully resonate with her partner was when she was not trying to do so. Why?

Why? Why? Why?

Maka sniffled, screwing up her face, and wiped her tears with the back of her sleeve.

She was tired. She was frustrated. She was in pain. She wanted to go back to the way things were before. She wished she had refused that assignment in Italy. She wished she had never set foot inside that old cathedral. She wished she had the good sense to run when she realized the danger. She wished that for once, she could do something—anything—without being such a hopeless failure.

Soul deserved better than that, after all he did for her. He had been so patient all this time, and she had done nothing but fail.

When he came to sit next to her, Maka turned her face away. Soul crossed his legs and leaned forward, wanting her to look at him, but she refused.

“What’s a’matter?” he asked.

“What do you think?”

Soul leaned back, straightening up, and put his hands in his lap. “I dunno,” he said. “You were all excited before.”

“Before when? Before I screwed it up—how many times now?” She reached up and tucked back the hair that had come loose from her pigtails. Then she pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms tight around them, and said to her shoes: “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”

“You’re not doin’ anything,” said Soul. “It hasn’t even been that long. You’re probably still just…” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him make some kind of vague gesture with his hands, like he was balling something up.

Maka pouted her lip. That was what it felt like, actually.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’ve got to get past this.”

Beside her, Soul heaved a sigh. “Saying that’s not gonna make it happen.”

A twinge of anger flickered to life in her belly. She held her tongue, though—quite literally, between her teeth—and sent Soul a sideways glare she hoped would suffice to tell him he was not making her feel better. He didn’t seem to notice.

“Maybe you just need some time,” he offered.

“Time?” said Maka.

“Yeah. For you to…get over whatever’s fucking with you.” He was sparing her feelings, pretending not to know what it was, and Maka was not sure whether she should be appreciative or offended.

“It’s not something I can just ‘get over,’” she said.

Soul looked like he was about to say something, but he must have thought better of it. He shut his mouth, and a long silence made itself comfortable between them.

Maka knew that he was right; at least, mostly right. Resonance was not something she could force. If it was not going to happen, then it was not going to happen, and that was that. But Soul had no idea how much she needed it. He had no idea how badly she needed to know that if it ever came down to it—if ever, God forbid, there was another dark night that found them in another dark cathedral—she would not fail him again. She would keep him safe.

She had to know she was not going to lose her partner.

And Soul did not understand. It was so easy for him to put himself in front of her. It was so easy for him to say he would do it again. He must not have known what it would do to her. She told him already—or tried to—but it was hard to put into words.

How do you just tell someone that?

How could she just tell him that even if she went on living, her life would be over without him? That he filled pieces of her she had no idea were missing until she met him? How could she explain to him how hollow she would feel without him there beside her?

How could she explain that to Soul? Soul, who hid everything he felt behind those long, lingering looks; the ones that told her there was something more—something he was so afraid to show her?

The same look he was giving her now.

He said nothing, but his eyes kept no secrets.

“What?” said Maka.

Soul frowned. It took a moment for him to say, “Nothing.”

“It’s something.”

“It’s—” Soul looked down at his hands. “It’s you stayin’ up all night over this.”

Oh, Soul.

Maka smiled for the first time in a while. Then she reached out and put a hand on his arm. He stiffened up, but did not pull away from her like she thought he would.

“Hey,” she said, “you don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be okay.”

“When?” said Soul. “When are you gonna be okay? ‘Cause you’re not okay right now.”

“I’ll be okay when this all goes away.”

“What if it never does?”

Maka’s smile disappeared. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“I mean—” He was still not looking at her. This time, it was her that leaned forward, trying to catch his eye. He turned away from her. “I mean what if we can’t ever do it again?”

“We just did! Just the other night, we did.”

“Yeah, but—”

“But what? Don’t say that. I’m gonna figure it out.”

“What if it’s not you?”

The tangle of things that lived inside her stomach twisted suddenly. She felt something like it before, when she was falling in her dreams. It was the tight, panicky feeling that came when the floor made of glass shattered underneath her, hurling her down into the waiting abyss.

It did feel as if part of the world had fallen away.

She never thought of that before—that it may not have been her. It had to be, she thought; otherwise, it must have been Soul, and there was nothing wrong with Soul.

A nauseous feeling crept up into her throat.

There was nothing wrong with Soul.

“What’re you talking about?” Her voice was thicker than it had been a moment ago. “Why would it not be me?”

He sounded so exasperated when he said, “I don’t know.”

“What do you mean, you don’t know? Is something wrong?”

“I don’t know!”

Soul winced then, like he was startled by the sound of his own voice. Maka was not fazed. She kept on staring at him, looking for answers in his eyes, but all she saw there was frustration.

“Soul,” she said softly.

The corners of his mouth tightened into a frown. “I gotta tell you something,” he said. “I don’t think you’re gonna like it.”

Maka’s stomach dropped.

“I’m not trying to hurt you,” said Soul.

“Hurt me?”

“I thought it was you at first. Maybe it was. I don’t know. My head’s been fucked ever since you had that dream.”

Memories of that night rolled into her head like a deep, melancholy mist. She remembered how frightened Soul looked, and how his hands trembled while he held her. He was scared in the moment—she knew that—but for him to say that he was still shaken over it took her by surprise. It felt so long ago now.

“Soul,” she said, “I’m okay. It was just a nightmare.”

“That’s the thing,” said Soul. “I don’t know if it was.”

“What else would it be?”

“I—” Soul raked a hand back through his hair. “I don’t know. I don’t know what they are, but I’m having ‘em, too. I’ve been having ‘em since before you, and I don’t know if they got into you from me, or if—”

He spoke so quickly he almost stumbled over his own words. None of what he said made any sense to Maka. How could nightmares not be nightmares? How could they have come from him? There was no way they could have travelled across the link between souls; she and Soul had not successfully resonated since the nightmares started. Except…

Except for once. Her dream that night had been so different from the others. Was that the kind of nightmare he had been having? Lost in the dark, alone with something unknowable? Was that what was so terrifying to him?

Maka did not give voice to any of those questions. All she said was: “‘If?’”

“If…” Soul hesitated, trying to straighten out the jumble of words on his tongue. “If being close to me is gonna make it worse or not.”

Maka’s heart broke a little bit.

“Being close to you’s not gonna make anything worse,” she said. How could it?

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Then tell me! You keep talking and talking, but you’re not telling me anything.”

“It’s—”

Soul breathed in slow, held it, and then let it out in a long sigh. He still did not look at her; he just kept staring at his hands, fidgeting nervously with his fingers. Finally, he said, “You were already so fucked up over this, I didn’t wanna tell you.”

“Didn’t tell me what?”

“I don’t know how much sense I can make it make—I mean…”

Maka felt like she was about to be sick. “Soul, tell me what?”

“It’s not just nightmares,” he said. “It’s the same one, over and over. And there’s something in there that wants something from me.”

“Something?”

The word called to mind the feeling of cold breath down her shoulders, and she shivered in spite of the setting sun at her back.

“I don’t know what it is,” said Soul. “I don’t really know what it wants, either, but it’ll use you to get it. It tried before.”

There were so many things she wanted to ask. She wanted to know what “something” meant; what it was, and what it wanted. She wanted to know why Soul seemed so sure it was more than just a nightmare. They had both been through so much. He had been through so much. It was not so strange to have bad dreams after something so awful. Maka was sure that her nightmares, at least, were not as nefarious as Soul made them sound.

Most of them, anyway.

There was no denying the dream she had during their resonance was somehow different from the others, but she did not know how it came to be that way. She supposed he could be right: His dream could have bled into hers. But that meant nothing. It was still just a dream. There was nothing in Soul’s head that could hurt him, nor her.

Right?

Maka remembered the thing that lived in the dark, creeping along after her and breathing its cold breath down her neck. She remembered the feeling—the intuition that there was something out there it wanted. She remembered feeling as if she needed to reach Soul before it did, or something terrible would happen.

But that could not have been so. Nightmares did not hurt people, and if not nightmares, what else could they have been?

Maka’s eyes flitted down to Soul’s chest, and her stomach lurched up into her throat. She shifted uncomfortably, propping herself on her hand and leaning on her hip. Then she said, “What do you mean, ‘it?’ What is ‘it?’”

Soul swallowed. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Soul—”

“If I knew what to tell you, I would.”

That was a lie, thought Maka. “You haven’t told me anything,” she said, “except you’re having nightmares. I knew that already.”

“I told you what you gotta know,” said Soul.

Maka stuck out her lip at him. He glanced up at her, then down to his hands, and then back up to her. “What?” he said.

“Why tell me at all if you’re not gonna tell me everything?”

Soul rolled his eyes.

“I mean it,” said Maka. “You’re always keeping things from me.”

“I’m not.”

“You are!”

Soul’s patience started to fray; she could see it in his eyes. “Why wouldn’t I?” he said. “Have you seen you lately? I don’t want you worrying about me. Worry about you.”

A spark of anger reignited down in the bottom of her belly, underneath the tumult of feelings that still roiled there. “It’s not that easy,” she said. “Believe it or not, I care about you.”

More than you think I do, she thought to herself. Why was that so difficult for him to understand?

Soul straightened up, hands on his knees, and said, “I know. But I’m not tellin’ you this so you got another thing to worry about.”

“Another thing to worry about?” said Maka. “You mean you? Like I haven’t been worrying about you all this time?”

“I know—”

“You made me promise we were gonna do this together.”

She thought it ended there, too. She should have known better. She should have known he would still worry; still try to protect her. He would still think of himself last, and Maka, despite knowing that was not about to change, would still find it just as frustrating.

“You’re not getting it,” Soul said through his teeth.

“What’s there not to get? You’re keeping me out—after you made me promise!—because now you’re afraid I’m gonna get hurt somehow.”

“This isn’t just ‘get hurt,’ Maka! I don’t know what this thing can do to you.”

“This is all happening because you thought you had to keep me safe!”

Saying it made her bite her tongue.

It was the wrong thing to say. The wrong thing at the wrong time, but it was gone out of her mouth before she had a chance to think better of it.

And Soul reacted exactly how she expected he would. He buried his fingers in the front of his shirt and said, “What do you want me to do, huh? Nothing? Should I’ve just done fuckin’ nothing?”

All of a sudden, it got deathly cold, and pin-drop quiet. Something inside of her fell then. It fell further than it should have been able to fall.

Soul paled. The look on his face—the anger—started to soften when he realized what he said, but it was too little too late. He might as well have reached in and gutted her. It felt like he had.

They were even, then, she thought bitterly, feeling the beginnings of tears stinging the back of her throat. She leaned away, pulling up her knees, and tried to speak. “You think—” Her voice trembled. So did her lip. She bit down on it, and then, slowly, she said, “You think I don’t wish you did?”

“I—”

“You think I don’t wish it was me instead?”

“I wouldn’t’ve—”

“Wouldn’t’ve let that happen,” said Maka. “I know! I know, I know, I know!” She balled up her fists, digging her fingers into her palms, and dragged the back of her sleeve across her cheek. “But how do you think I feel? There’s nothing you would do for me I wouldn’t do for you, too!”

She said it just like he did: easy, without having to think twice about it. She meant it, too. If she had the chance, she would have taken the blow that was meant for her. She would have protected him, if only he would let her. But he was too stubborn, and he cared too much, just like her.

What remained of her voice shattered like glass when she tried to say, “I promised,” and in Soul’s eyes, she could see his heart break.

She stared up at him, lips pressed into a thin frown, until a hiccup bounced up into her throat. Then she felt her chin quiver, and saw Soul’s eyes flicker down to her lips. He opened his mouth as if he were about to say something, but nothing came out; all he did was swallow dryly before dragging his gaze slowly back up to hers.

“You…don’t,” he said. “You don’t know.”

“What?”

Then he lifted his hand. She thought he was going to try to wipe away her tears, and she wanted to turn away. She did not need him to comfort her; not after what he said. She wanted him to do nothing. But when he reached up, fingers grazing her skin, and rubbed his thumb across her cheek to catch a tear, she could only find it in her to squeeze her eyes shut.

Maka furrowed her brow, confused and impatient, and she started to say, “What don’t I know?” She choked on her words, though, when next thing she knew, she felt warm breath kiss her lips.

Her heart sprang into the back of her throat, and her eyes flew open to find Soul much, much too close to her. His eyes were shut, too, but only for a moment, until she leaned away suddenly, shoving him in the shoulder as she went. Soul stole his hand away then, just like he had when she caught him with his fingers in her hair. He looked at her, wide-eyed, open-mouthed, and panic gushed into her veins.

She lifted a hand to her mouth, covering it with quivering fingers. Things inside her—things she had felt for so long but had no name for—swelled to bursting in her chest, leaving no space for her to breathe.

Tongue in knots, she managed to ask, “What’re you doing?”

Scarlet bled into Soul’s cheeks. “I—” came tumbling out of his mouth, and she could tell he was trying to think of how to lie to her. It was too late for that, though. Try as he might to explain away what had just happened, things were starting to fall into place inside Maka’s head: why he was so determined to keep her safe; why he was so willing to hurt himself for her; why he always looked at her the way he did, with something hidden behind his eyes. It was there now, too, bare for her to see, and it melted her down to nothing.

Soul stammered the beginnings of something like “I’m sorry,” but never finished his thought. All he did was curse under his breath, then scramble to his feet. Maka reached out, hoping to snag his sleeve as he turned, only to grab a handful of empty air.

“Soul!”

And for the first time, he did not come when she called.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art in this chapter was made by @alcruid and @fuzzyfur455!


	4. The Mouth of Madness

Soul sat with his head in his hands, and his elbows on his knees. He rubbed his face and raked his fingers back through his hair, trying not to hear the music beside him. It went on as if nothing was wrong. Soul wanted to stand up and sweep the gramophone off the table. He wanted to watch it hit the floor and shatter into a hundred little pieces, never to play that damn song again. He was sick of it. He was sick. Sick. Sick.

He wanted to go back. He wanted to do things different. He wanted to wake up and find that it was all a dream: that he never hurt Maka; that he never made her cry; and most of all, that he never showed her the one thing he always knew he should keep from her.

He kept asking himself: What were you thinking?

He was thinking that maybe, if he showed her, she would understand, and maybe, if she understood, it would take away some of the hurt. Then maybe, if she hurt a little less, the nightmares would not bother her so much, and if the nightmares went away, then he could be her partner again.

He wanted to be close to her again without worrying that he might hurt her, but all he did was push her further away.

Worst of all, after all that, he was too selfish to stand and face her rejection. He ran and hid like a coward, and he hated himself for it. He was always, always running away, and finally, he was caught, backed up into a corner with nowhere to go but out. He was not ready to go out, though. He wanted to stay in a little while longer; keep his head buried under his pillows; forget that come morning, he would have to look Maka in the eyes and face what he had done.

Something slithered into the room behind him. He felt it come, like a dark, thick shadow, blotting out the light from above. Soul grit his teeth. “Get out,” he said.

The creature clicked its tongue. “If I didn’t know better,” it said, “I would start to think you didn’t appreciate my company.” The voice Soul so reviled mingled with the nauseating music, lilting up and down in time with the melody as the creature swayed slowly from side to side. “I’ll forgive you this time, though. You had quite the day, didn’t you?”

“I don’t wanna hear it.”

It smiled then, and the way its teeth shifted around inside its mouth turned Soul’s stomach.

“I know you didn’t mean to do that. Come on. You know what would make her feel better?”

“Fuck off.”

Its smile faltered. Malice flickered in its eyes. It was growing impatient, thought Soul, but he could not be bothered to care.

“Always so selfish,” it admonished. “You don’t want to lose her, do you? Over something so silly? I know how it must make you feel to see her this way.”

Soul’s fingers twitched. “You don’t know anything about how I feel.”

Just like that, its grin was back, grotesque as ever, and Soul wondered if he had said the wrong thing; something to make it think it could still get what it wanted. “Oh, but I do,” said the creature. “Did you forget?”

The needle of the gramophone dragged across the record, making a low grinding noise that stiffened Soul’s spine. In his peripheral, he saw the thing’s shadow, longer than it should have been, jittering on the red velvet curtains. The silhouette of its bulbous head was split across the middle by a hollow grin.

“She’s very special to you, isn’t she? Wouldn’t you do anything for her?”

Soul closed his eyes tight and, in vain, said, “Shut up.”

It did not listen.

“Come on, now. Think of someone other than yourself. Think of poor Maka.”

No sooner had her name left its wicked, slimy little tongue than Soul was up on his feet. He stood, grabbing the chair by the back and shoving it aside so hard it toppled over, knocking into the table beside it with a horrible clamor. The gramophone wobbled, and the record hissed out its terrified scream.

“Keep her name out of your fucking mouth!” Soul shouted—to no one.

In front of him, behind the space where the chair had been, there was nothing. The thing had vanished as if it had never been there at all. It took a moment for Soul to realize the music was gone, too, and longer to realize that the lack of it left him feeling no less sick.

Gone though the creature may have been, its words still whirled around inside Soul’s head. “Think of poor Maka,” it said, as if he could think of anything else; as if he could forget how she looked with her big green eyes full of tears.

All he wanted was to keep her safe. He wanted to protect her from whatever was inside of him. He thought he was choosing the lesser of two hurts, but somehow, he always seemed to choose wrong. Whatever he did, no matter how hard he tried, he only seemed to hurt her more. It twisted his stomach to see her look at him the way she did in the hospital room, and in his bed, and across the kitchen table: eyes full of worry, and fear, and pain. He wanted to take it away from her. He wanted her to know it was okay.

But she wanted something else.

He kept thinking of the promise she made: “I’m not gonna let it happen again.”

Yeah, well, neither would he.

• • • • •

That long, hot day melted into a long, hot night. Maka passed it in the company of a novel she had read many times before. The familiarity was a small comfort to her, and anyway, it felt good to read something she liked after spending so much time in her textbooks.

Never mind how her eyes stung; staying awake with her book was better than trying to sleep. Tired as she was, she did not like the idea of being alone in the dark with only her thoughts to occupy her. She would wind herself up, thinking of all the things she should have said, and regretting the things she did.

She felt like a fool.

After what happened, she had not seen Soul all day. By the time she came home alone, he was locked tight behind his bedroom door. She imagined the sound of music in his ears or a pillow over his head muffled whatever she tried to say to him, because when she spoke, asking for him to come out, he did not answer her. So she went to her room, brought a book to the sofa, and she sat there by herself, reading, waiting to hear his door open. It never did.

She watched out the window as the purple sky paled to gray. The stars came out. Night fell, and Soul stayed locked in his room.

A few times, Maka wandered into the kitchen, always taking care to make just a little bit of noise; enough to let him know that she was awake, just in case he wanted to come talk to her. Evidently, though, he did not, and Maka was not sure why she expected any different.

She had no idea what she would have said, anyway. She wanted to tell him how she felt, but…how did she feel? She loved Soul. Of course she did. She loved Soul in the way she thought she was supposed to love her best friend, but the longer she thought about it—the more time she spent dwelling on the last few days—the more she doubted herself.

She kept thinking of how easy it had been to fall asleep with him there next to her; how her heart skipped a beat when he wrapped her up in his arms, holding her as if she were the most precious thing in the world; how he had tried so hard to comfort her, even when he was scared, too. He set aside his fear for her. He set aside himself for her. He loved her, too, in a way. Maka wondered why he was so afraid to let her see.

Then she thought of his breath on her lips, and how she panicked when she felt it. She thought of how thoroughly she had refused his kiss, and then realized: That was why. That was why he pulled his hand away, looking at her the way he did when she caught him playing with her hair; that was why he always seemed to begrudge showing her affection. He was afraid it would be rebuffed. He was afraid she would not want it. He was afraid of being pushed away.

What did he expect, though? He had chosen the worst possible time to try and kiss her. If it were another time, and another place, then maybe…

She reached the end of her page without reading a word, and, curling up her toes, buried her face in her book.

Oh, Soul. Why did he have to be so…

A sudden noise from behind the wall startled her out of her thoughts. It was quiet and muffled, but familiar enough to make out: It was Soul’s voice, and it sounded as if he were saying something—or trying to, at least, through a mouthful of sleep. A whimper came soon after, and the shuffling of blankets, too, making it sound as if he were struggling to get out of bed.

Maka sat up with a start.

Oh, no, she thought. No, no; not now, after it had been so quiet.

She almost closed her book. She almost set it aside and stood; almost wandered to his door, and almost knocked, calling out: “Soul?” There was no time for that, though. It seemed that no sooner had she realized what was happening than she heard the squeaking of bedsprings, and then the sound of frantic footsteps in the other room. Maka’s heart lodged itself in her throat.

The doorknob twisted, and out of the bedroom stumbled Soul. He walked crooked and clumsy, like he had woken up too fast, and for a moment, he looked lost. At first, he had his back to her, but then, suddenly, he whirled around on his heel, turning so quickly he almost fell into the corner of the wall.

Soul scrunched up his face, blinking against the light of the floor lamp. Cold sweat glittered in the dip of his collar. His cheeks were flushed; hair a mess, and his fingers trembled. He looked very much the same as he had that night—that first night she dreamed of Italy. He looked frightened and confused. He looked desperate. He looked like he wanted to go to her. She saw words well up on the back of his tongue, but he did not seem to know what to say.

Finally, after a few long seconds, he found his voice and, breathless, managed to croak, “Maka?”

She lifted her book up to her nose.

Soul leaned sideways on his shoulder, then reached up, dragging a hand through his hair and down the back of his neck. “Why’re—” He cleared the sleep from his throat. “Why’re you up?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” she said softly.

Something flickered across Soul’s eyes. He looked down at her book, and then to the coffee table, where a cup of black tea sat puffing steam. “You been awake?” he said, asking without asking if the nightmares had woken her up, too.

“Yeah,” said Maka.

A breath he must have been holding left him in a huff.

He looked like he wanted to say more—looked, like always, as if he were holding something back. She wanted to say something, too, but nothing felt right. For want of something better, she asked him: “You okay?”

Soul nodded his head, and Maka frowned, knowing it was a lie. She glanced awkwardly down at her book, then closed it and, tossing her legs over the edge of the couch, set it down on the coffee table. Then she squashed herself into one corner, up against the wooden armrest, and held her empty hand out toward Soul.

He almost fell over himself.

As eagerly as he closed the distance to the couch, he hesitated to sit down, afraid, she supposed, that she would recoil if he came too close. So, then, she reached for him, taking his hand in hers and pulling him down sideways. “C’mere,” she said, and threw her arms around his neck.

Soul tipped forward. His shoulders went rigid, and his chest, slick with a cold sweat, stilled as he seemed to forget how to breathe. He stayed very stiff for a very long time, until finally, an arm came around her waist, and he dug his fingers into the loose fabric of her nightshirt. Then, discontent with that, he did the same thing again, higher, between her shoulders, and buried his face in her neck.

Little by little, he struggled closer, hugging her tighter, and her heart cracked in two. He held her like he needed her; like he missed her; like he was afraid that if he let go, she would somehow disappear. She was not going anywhere. He was always there for her when she needed him, and if he needed her now, then right there she would be. It was awkward to be so close, and it was strange the way her heart throbbed, fluttering up, up, up into the bottom of her throat—but she was not about to let go.

Maka closed her eyes, and she leaned her cheek into the top of his head. “What was it about?” she asked, twirling a bit of his hair between her fingers.

“Huh?”

“Your dream. What was it about?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

Soul’s voice was smothered in the collar of her shirt, and for a moment, she thought maybe she misheard him. A pang of disappointment dropped into her stomach when she realized she had not, and that in spite of everything, Soul was still being Soul.

She wanted to push, press, prod; assure him that it was alright, and that whatever it was, he could tell her. She hesitated, though, remembering how she felt the first time she had a nightmare; how all she wanted was to forget. And then, as she struggled with all the words rolling over one another inside her head, Soul said something else; something that caught her by surprise: “Are we okay?”

She thought she misheard again. “What?” she said, glancing down at the top of his head.

“Me and you.”

The little fissure in her heart split deeper.

“Yeah.” She said it like a question. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

“‘Cause—” Soul kept trying to cram his face deeper into her collar. “I fucked up. I know I fucked up.”

He started talking quickly again, like he did when he had a lot to say and no idea how to say it. Tension poured off of him. She could feel it in his shoulders, and in his spine, and every slow, shallow breath he took. The way he pushed his face into her shoulder, it was almost as if he were trying to hide; almost as if he were embarrassed, or scared, or maybe both at once. Maka counted a few heartbeats before he spoke again.

“I wanted you to be okay,” he said. “I wanted you to know it’s okay. What happened. It’s…” He blew a frustrated sigh into her neck, coaxing a warm tingle up her spine, and then he said, “I think about it, too. If it was you, and not me, and it scares me, too. Losing you. And I’m fuckin’ stupid about it, but you’re—”

Then he lifted up his head, and all of a sudden, his face was very close to hers—again. Maka swallowed, following his gaze as it flickered nervously from her eyes to her lips.

After a moment, he said, “You’re a lot to me.” Nothing grand. Just a few little words, struggling under the weight of so many more. “I don’t wanna fuck things up with you forever.”

Maka thought: Forever? That was a long time. How angry did he think she was? She cracked a smile then, and something lit up behind Soul’s eyes.

“What’re you smiling for?” he asked.

“I’m not,” said Maka. She turned her face away, staring sideways at the mug atop the coffee table. She tried to stick out her lip, but it did not work so well. “I’m still mad at you.”

She tried her hardest to sound convincing, but she barely believed herself. It was strange. She felt like she should have been…more. It was a stupid stunt he pulled, ruining their resonance, but it was hard to blame him for doing what he did when she was very sure that, had it been her, she would have done the same.

Soul dipped his head, vying for her gaze. “I know,” he said. “I’m not good at saying ‘I’m sorry,’ but I am. I’m really, really fuckin’ sorry, and I wanna make it up to you.”

Maka blinked. When she opened her eyes next, she was staring past white porcelain, not really seeing anything. “Make it up?” she said.

“Yeah.”

With that, his hand moved from the back of her shirt. He started to lean away, and she did not want him to go. This time, though, she was not going to pull him back. She let him sit up, in part out of curiosity, which only grew when he held his hand out toward her. She eyed it, unsure of what he wanted her to do. Take it, she guessed, but what for?

“What are we doing?” asked Maka.

“Trust me.”

She did. Slowly, she lifted her hand to place it in his palm. He closed his fingers around it, and then moved to stand up. Confused, she followed, letting him lead her into the empty space between the sofa and the kitchen table.

“You remember the other night?” said Soul. “When we talked about chess?”

Maka screwed up her face. “I don’t think this is how you play.”

The way Soul smiled at her lit up little sparks underneath her heart. “Nah,” he said, “but I thought we could try somethin’ like it.” Then, gently, he lifted up her hand, holding it out beside them, while the other settled in the curve of her waist. “You know how to dance?”

Maka shook her head, and Soul blew out a breath; almost a laugh. “S’okay,” he said. “I do.”

He tried a step sideways, wanting her to follow. She almost did, too, but something made her hesitate. “I thought you didn’t want to do this,” she said.

“I don’t.”

She knew that already. Her question, then, was: “Why are we?”

“‘Cause you were right about me wanting to keep you safe.”

Those words sank heavy and cold into the pit of her stomach.

“There’s nothin’ I wouldn’t do for you.” He said it so easy, like always; no second thoughts. “And I told you, I’m stupid, and I do the wrong fuckin’ thing.”

She frowned at him then. As angry as she had been, it gave her no satisfaction to hear him berate himself for wanting to protect her. She wanted to protect him, too. That was why she was so angry in the first place.

For want of something better, she said, “It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” said Soul. “I should’ve just told you. I should’ve told you when you asked the first time, and the time after that, and I didn’t, ‘cause I didn’t want you to worry about me. I thought I was—I dunno.”

“Keeping me safe,” said Maka, resting her hand against his chest.

His breathing stilled for a moment. “Yeah.”

She knew.

She knew there was nothing he wouldn’t do for her; he didn’t have to tell her. She knew that everything he did, he did for her, and with that in her mind, she let her eyes fall away from his to the scar that lay beneath her fingers. It still hurt to look at. It reminded her of many things: of cold, dark churches and bright white lights; of blood, and fear, and failure. It was everything her nightmares were made of—and, she decided, it was time for her to face it.

Soul pulled on her waist, and this time, she followed him, letting him shuffle her around in a slow circle.

“You call for me like you did,” he said. “I’ll hear you.”

Maka nodded. She kept her eyes down, tracing her fingertips along the scar she had been so reluctant to touch. Staples kissed her fingers. She told herself she did not feel them. Instead, she poured all of her attention into the rhythm of Soul’s heartbeat, and the slight uptick it took when she dropped her head into the crook of his neck.

She felt him breathe in deep, then hold it. A little smile tugged at the corners of her lips.

“If you want out, then get out,” he said. “Don’t worry about me.”

“I’ll be okay,” said Maka. “I’m not scared of it. It should be scared of me.”

Soul chuckled under his breath. “You’re dumb,” he said.

Her smile broadened. “Maybe. I can’t let you have all the fun, though, doing dumb things for me.”

He pressed a smile into her hair then, but the way he held her—just a little too tight—told her he thought this endeavor was much more grave than he let on. Maybe he was trying not to frighten her. There was no need, though. She meant what she said: She was not scared. Whatever it was that had come between her and her partner, she was ready to see its face.

She let herself fall.

Only it did not feel so much like falling; more like floating. It was as if the floor had disappeared beneath her, and she were dancing on air, suspended by strings. Maka reached out, feeling the dead space in front of her, and turned herself around, hoping to touch something, or to catch a glimpse of some guiding light. There was nothing, though.

Nothing except for the nothingness itself.

Undulating black pressed in upon her. It inhaled, alive, and when it exhaled, she could feel its breath on her skin. It smelled like copper, and it turned her blood cold.

The warm gush of breath in her hair pulled softly at the strings that held her. “You’re okay,” came the thin sound of Soul’s voice. And she was, even as old nightmares clawed their way into her head: memories of an empty cathedral, smothered in dark with a floor made of glass.

She was okay. She knew it was not real. She knew there was nothing there that could hurt her.

Then, as if privy to her thoughts, the strings that held her were severed, and all at once, the weightlessness she felt disappeared. Maka thought she had been upside-down, but when she fell, she fell forward, crumpling onto her stomach, and into Soul’s chest.

She thought she felt him stumble; thought she heard him gasp as he caught her, but the sound was lost under the low, droning whistle between her ears. She groaned, and then, slowly, she gathered her arms underneath her and pushed herself upright. Over the sound of ringing in her ears, she heard herself say, “I’m okay,” but she did not feel the words leave her lips. It was strange, and for a moment, she thought that maybe she imagined it. Maybe she imagined Soul’s voice, too, and the feeling of his breath in her hair. She could still feel the warmth, though, and it reminded her of how cold she had been.

Maka swallowed copper. Fingers quivering, she crossed her arms, and then looked around her, trying to get her bearings. She hoped that she would see something of the warmth she felt—something of Soul—but it was only her, alone in the abyss, smothered by the smell of her nightmares.

She shuddered, huddling into her shoulders. A shaky breath rattled its way down her throat. Bad dreams crawled like spiders underneath her skin. She let herself feel them; let them remind her why she was there, and then she stood.

• • • • •

Yellow eyes bore into the back of Soul’s head. The little creature stood behind him, like it always did, swaying steadily from side to side. No music played; the only sound in the room save for the silence itself was the sharp, rhythmic snapping of its long, fat fingers.

“What are you trying to do?” it asked.

Soul tried to ignore it. Whatever it had to say did not matter. What mattered was the quiet. Somewhere out there was Maka, and when she called for him, he had to hear it. “Don’t talk to me,” he said.

As always, it did not listen. It cocked its head to the side and said, “Whatever it is, a lot of good you’re doing sitting there.”

A lot of good it did plummeting down into the dark, too, thought Soul. He could have opened the door again; could have thrown himself thoughtlessly into the abyss, but then what? He liked to chastise Maka for leaping before she looked. That was how he found himself here in the first place, he supposed. At least he knew where _here_ was. Out there, with no way of knowing how close he was to her, what good would he be? All he could do was chase blindly after the sound of her voice.

And he had not heard it yet.

He kept waiting, hoping to hear her call out his name, but so far, all he heard was a grating voice and that irritating—fucking—snapping.

Crossing one leg over the other, Soul leaned sideways in his chair. He closed his eyes and pressed his shaking fingers into his temple. “Shut up,” he said.

It never listened.

“Aren’t you going after her?”

“No.”

Snap. Snap. Silence.

A smile split its face in two, and every nerve in Soul’s body lit up. “Ohh,” it said. “Is she coming here? Should I tidy up?”

“You should fuck off is what you should do,” said Soul, “‘cause if you go anywhere near her, I’ll—”

Laughter swelled through the silence, and through Soul’s voice. The thing waved a dismissive hand in the air and said, “Don’t worry. I’ll make myself scarce.”

It took all he had not to get up out of his chair. He wanted to keep on barking threats, even if he knew it was useless. The damned thing was just so good at boiling his blood. And that was what it wanted, he supposed. It wanted to distract him; take his attention off the silence behind the curtains. That was not going to happen.

Soul sucked in a long, deep breath, then blew it out slow.

If it thought he was joking—that there was nothing he could do; that he wouldn’t tear himself apart to keep it away from her—that was its problem, not his. No matter what it took, nothing in there—not that thing; not what crawled behind the red velvet; and not himself—nothing was going to hurt the girl he loved.

• • • • •

Something flickered.

She did not see it; she felt it. It felt like the striking of a matchstick somewhere deep inside her chest. Sparks flew, struggling for life; struggling to grow into something more.

Maka breathed in deep the smell of blood, ignoring how it stung the back of her throat. She knew that feeling.

“Soul?” she said.

Innumerable eyes turned her way.

A great, gaping mouth opened up beneath her, and for the second time, she fell—but not far. She toppled forward into the cold, empty abyss, and into the familiar warmth of Soul’s chest. She felt him pull her tight; heard him murmur, “I got you,” and just like that, as if by little puppet strings, she was caught and stood upright again.

It took a moment for her to catch her breath, and to swallow her heart back down into her chest. In that time, she poured herself into the feeling of Soul’s heartbeat under hers; tried not to lose it in the abating panic.

“Soul?” she called again, quieter this time, toeing the floor in front of her. It was cold and hard, and covered in something viscous that stuck to her skin when she moved. With her hands, she reached out, and she felt the tips of her fingers brush against something solid. It was a strange texture: coarse and dry, not like the floor.

She turned away from it, feeling the dead air to the side of her, and then turned and took a step forward, only to nearly fall again when the floor dropped out from underneath her. She stumbled, leaning her weight into the wall, and into Soul.

He rested his cheek on the top of her head. “Keep talking,” he said. “I hear you.”

Strangely, even though she could feel his head on top of hers, his voice seemed to come from somewhere below her.

“I can hear you, too,” she said, eyeing the abyss before her. “It’s dark.”

“I know,” said Soul. “It’s okay. I’m not gonna let you fall.”

Maka took a deep gulp of stale air. She closed her eyes, feeling the ghost of hands on her back, and then, holding her breath, she stepped forward. She thought that Soul would catch her, but to her surprise, there was no need. Not far below where she stood, the ball of her foot came to rest on something similarly solid. Then, below that, the same thing.

Stairs, she realized. She was in a staircase.

Keeping her hands against the wall, she shuffled forward, feeling with her toes until she found the edge of the stair, and then stepping slowly down. Disconcertingly, the further down she went, the more the walls seemed to warp and twist under her hands, shifting ever upward, away from her. Maka tried not to feel it. She occupied herself by counting the heartbeats that echoed in her ears.

For a long time, she continued down, down, down into the dark, chasing the flicker of warmth in the cold. She spent so long staring into the pitch black, she thought that when she saw a faint blue glow below her, it must have been her eyes playing tricks on her. It did not go away, though; the further down she went, the brighter it seemed, and the way it illuminated the stairs, perfectly outlining the edges, could not have been her imagination.

“Is that you?” she asked.

But Soul did not answer her.

The little blue light danced on, and she followed it, watching it grow brighter, until finally, she saw its source. It was a tiny flame, much brighter than it should have been, at the end of a long, white candle. It jutted out of the wall, held in place by a delicate iron frame. Maka reached for it, wanting to take it with her, but as soon as she did, blue light burst to life further down the stairs.

She turned so quickly she nearly lost her footing. Her breath hitched, light stinging her eyes as it flooded the staircase. She lifted an arm and, squeezing her eyes shut, tucked her face away.

Soft, smooth music filled the air around her.

Maka raised her head, blinking against the light. “Soul?” she said, and again received no answer. She squinted, peering down the staircase and finding that, perplexingly, it was no longer a staircase at all—rather, it was many all at once. Above her, below her, and at her sides, stairs upon stairs were tangled together like a maze, all leading down into an abyss still untouched by the blue light.

Mouth agape, Maka leaned sideways into the wall, looking up, then down.

The stairs—all of them—were made of polished wood, and some, like hers, were bordered by crumbling walls papered in dark red. Others had banisters, and others still were open, and Maka was grateful she had not found herself on one of those.

“Soul?” she called again, a little louder this time. “Can you still hear me?”

The music droned on, coming, as all things seemed to, from somewhere far below her. The only thing up above was the black abyss, and, Maka noted, throwing a quick glance over her shoulder, something viscous dripping down the stairs, as if the darkness itself were oozing along after her. She swallowed, and then took another step down, dragging the tips of her fingers along the wallpaper as she went. Even if she no longer needed to feel her way through, the sensation kept her grounded. It was her one constant as everything else began to shift around her.

Black dripped down from the nothingness above her head, and inside of it, things moved. It started in a small way; Maka could not see it, but she felt it. She pressed in closer to the wall, her heart hurling itself into her chest like a caged animal. She felt very small, and very alone—but she would not let herself be afraid.

“I’m trying to find you,” she said to herself, hoping to find some comfort in the sound of her own voice, “but I can’t if you won’t tell me where you are.”

Still, Soul did not answer. All she heard was music, and a pair of heartbeats, one ticking up much quicker than the other. The way her fingers trembled against the wall, she supposed that one must have been hers.

Clinging to the fading vestiges of her courage, Maka kept her eyes down, trying not to see the little blue candles flickering in and out of the walls around her. She stared at the end of the stairs, where they disappeared into the dark, and realized after some time that that point never came any closer. She reasoned, however, that she must have been moving; otherwise, where would the doorway in the wall have come from?

A little further down, there was a wooden frame set into the wallpaper, looking as if it were supposed to have a door, but did not. It was empty, and led into what appeared to be nothingness. Maka thought to stick her head through it, but then decided she had better not. She passed it by, only to find another not much later, and then another, and another.

Out from one of them came a sudden gush of cold breath that sent her scampering over to the other side of the hall. The smell of blood struck her again, so thick she could taste it, and she held her breath, covering her mouth with her hand.

“Soul!” she cried through her fingers.

She wanted to close her eyes—wanted to try to feel his hands on her back, or his breath in her hair, or something of his warmth around her—but she was afraid that when she opened them again, things would have changed. She felt as if the world in which she stood was very fragile, held together by little strings, like the kind that caught her when she fell, and that they were fraying. Far away, sets of stairs half-eaten by the dark looked as if they were melting. Some twisted and wobbled, collapsing in on themselves. Maka was afraid that her stairs would begin to do the same.

She was afraid, too, of what existed behind the empty doorways. Things inside them were crawling. Eyes—far too many eyes—watched her from the veil of darkness. Sometimes, in her peripheral, she thought she could see something reaching out toward her, but when she looked, it was always gone.

Black oozed out onto the stairs, drip-drip-dripping down after her. Shadows of small things danced animatedly on the walls beside her, jittering along to the swelling music. It was getting louder.

She was getting closer.

Photographs hung in dense golden frames in between doorways. Some were of people Maka did not know, and places she did not recognize. Some were of her. Those seemed clearer than the others.

The staircase curved sharply to the right. Then it curved again, and then suddenly, there were two. Further down, there were four, then six, jutting out of one another at all angles, some of them twisting like corkscrews, and some upside-down.

All of them were lined by the same empty doorways—only they were not so empty anymore. A few of them had doors hanging in them. All were closed, and all were struggling at their hinges. Whatever it was that moved behind them wanted to come out.

“Maka?”

The sound of Soul’s voice froze her blood.

There was something wrong with it. There was something wrong with the way it sounded; with how it seemed to come from all around her. She wanted to believe it was him, but that could not have been so. Something in her recoiled from it.

“Is that you?” said the thing that was not Soul.

Maka could not have answered if she wanted to. Her tongue was like lead in her mouth. It took her a moment to keep moving, and when she did, she stepped quicker than before.

Soul’s voice kept swirling around her. “Can you hear me?” he asked. “Let me in. It’s cold.”

And it was; colder behind her, she realized, as breath ghosted down her back. Looking over her shoulder, she found the drip-drip-drip of black down the stairs had turned to a trickle. She was getting closer—and something was getting closer to her, too. It bore down upon her, speaking to her with a voice like Soul’s, filling her mouth with the coppery stench of its breath.

She wanted to call out to him again, but when she tried, fear clogged her throat.

All she could do was run.

She ran so quickly that she almost fell. The walls, and the doorways, and the photographs—all of it blurred past her as she hurried down the stairs, away from whatever it was that was closing in behind her. Soul’s voice chased after her, while she chased after him—the real him, and the music that was rising out of the yawning abyss below.

Everything inside of her burned. Fear lit up her blood. Her chest—her heart and her lungs, all—felt as if they were about to burst. She wanted out, out, out.

“If you want out,” Soul said, “then get out.”

Maka shook her head and said, “I’m not scared.”

Hallways narrowed. Staircases wobbled, twisted, and circled back in on one another, converging into a tangled spiral. All of them—every single one—led to the same place: straight down.

Down she went.

Shadows chased after her, chittering and clawing restlessly at the walls. Black oozed out of the red wallpaper and onto the stairs, sticking to her feet, and to her hands as she felt her way through. 

The fading blue light from above glinted off of something in the distance. Music howled, calling out to her, and she followed. She chased the light, and the song, and the beckoning of a soul so close to hers, all the way down to the bottom.

There, at the end of a long hall papered in peeling burgundy, was a door. It was the silver knob that glittered in the choking light, and, Maka noticed, it was still. It did not rattle. It did not shake. Nothing moved behind it. No voices, either; the only sound from within was music. That must have been it, she thought. That must have been what she was looking for.

That must have been Soul.

Relief poured into her chest. Then, no sooner had she realized she was staring down at the end of the hall—the end of a nightmare—than the light died entirely, plunging her into an impossible dark. It was darker than she had ever seen, and so thick she could feel it all around her. It smothered her; crushed her; tried to swallow her whole. Wraithlike fingers ghosted along her legs, wanting to sink into her skin, and Maka recoiled. She squirmed and kicked, breath trapped in her tightening throat, and then…

She was hurled headfirst into the slab of wood. Cold breath closing in at her back, her shaking hands struggled for the doorknob, but when she turned it—locked.

The sparks under her chest fizzled. The cold ebbed out of her bones, and slowly, as if waking from a dream, her senses came back to her one by one. The frantic beating of hearts faded into silence. The only sounds were the soft shuffling of footsteps, and the quiet chirping of crickets outside. Darkness swam around the edges of her vision. It was not the deep dark she had been in before; it was the gray, hazy dark of the kitchen at night, softened by the thin yellow glow of the nightlight on the wall.

Her heart went crashing down into her stomach.

Maka ground the dance to a halt. She popped her head up, and a dull ache rang through her cheek, sore, she supposed, from being pressed too long into Soul’s shoulder.

Soul.

Her eyes found his, and he frowned at her, confused, probably, as to what had startled her so thoroughly. “What’s wrong?” he asked, and she had no idea how to answer. She was confused, too. She thought that was it—that she had done it, but something must have gone wrong. Something kept her from reaching him. Something came between them. Something. Something. Always something.

Frustration boiled up in her. “I was—I was right there,” she said. “I don’t know what happened. I was—I—”

Soul dipped his head down. His eyes, full of concern, searched hers, and she wanted to look away. The only way to look was down, though, and all she would see there was—

“Hey,” he said softly. “You okay? Your hands’re shaking.”

Her first thought was to lie. Like always, she wanted to tell him she was okay—and she was. She was not cold anymore. There was no black ooze sticking to her heels. Nothing clawed at the walls; nothing blew its foul breath down her neck; nothing lurched after her, clamoring on too many legs down warped staircases. She was home. She was safe.

She was okay. And that was just it.

“I thought I did it right,” she murmured.

“You did,” said Soul. “I heard you talking.”

“I heard you, too. I heard music.”

“Music?”

“I tried to find it, but when I got there, it just…ended.”

“Where’s ‘there?’” asked Soul.

And all Maka could think to say was: “A door.” What was behind it, she didn’t know, but she had the unmistakable, dreamlike intuition that it was where she needed to be.

Soul seemed perplexed by that answer. He screwed up his face and said, “A door?”

“I tried to open it,” said Maka, “and it wouldn’t, and then it ended.”

Something kept her out in the dark. Something did not want to let her inside, and she wondered: Was it her? Or was it Soul?

Her heart sank at the thought. It could have been him, she supposed, but she did not want to believe it any more than she wanted to believe she had ruined it herself. She did not want to think he could have lied to her face; that he would let her go through all of that only to shut her out at the last second. He seemed so genuine, and now, he looked just as confused as she was. There was no smug satisfaction in his eyes; no apprehension that he may be caught in a lie. All she saw there was silent bewilderment as he hung on her words, trying to understand, like she was, what had gone wrong.

It was a bitter relief to realize that it was her.

Had it been her all along? She thought she tried everything. She spent days studying, devouring book after book in hopes she might stumble upon something she missed, but nothing helped. “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong,” she said to herself.

“C’mon,” said Soul, “you did fine. You’re gonna figure it out.”

“What if I don’t?”

“You will,” he said easily. “You know why?”

Maka did not answer. She still wanted to look away—look down—but she was afraid of what she would see. She did not want to be reminded of the pain her own failure had caused. Her eyes did wander, though, only to be caught a moment later by the curve of a smile she had not expected to see. “‘Cause,” said Soul, “you’re the most stubborn person I know.”

The affection that brimmed in his voice made things inside her twist and tangle and tumble all over one another. The feeling worsened when gentle fingers began tracing her spine through her shirt, wandering up and down the small of her back. She arced away from them—toward him—without thinking about it, and watched his smile crack into a crooked, toothy grin.

Then she realized she was staring. Her breath hitched, and she dragged her eyes back up to his as warmth poured into her cheeks.

Either Soul did not notice, or pretended not to for her sake. “You’re gonna be fine,” he said. “Go easy on yourself for a while. I’ll be here when you wanna try again.”

And maybe he was right. Maybe all she needed was time. Or maybe…

An idea snuck its way into her head, and as soon as it did, she wished she could unthink it. Not that it was such a terrible thought, but she was afraid it would wander down the fraying threads that still connected them. She was afraid Soul would know she thought it.

There was something she had been ignoring: that nagging, twisting, white-hot feeling in her belly. It had not left her all night. Ever since that afternoon in the field, it had been slowly unraveling itself, and now it was worse than ever. It filled her chest so full she could hardly breathe, and she felt as if she were starting to drown.

All this time she spent wondering: What was it?

And then Soul kissed her.

Almost.

Now everything was upside-down, and she had no idea how she was supposed to feel. She doubted everything she thought she knew about her feelings for her very best friend. If ever there were something that would ruin a resonance, that was it.

But Soul never mentioned it, aside from a quick, cobbled-together apology. Was he hoping she would forget about it? Go on as if nothing happened? How could she?

“I want to try one more thing.”

Soul’s smile faltered, and for a moment, she almost regretted asking. It must have hurt him to see her the way she was, so bitter and disappointed. It would have hurt her to see him like that, and to know he blamed himself.

“Maka—”

“I think we can do it.”

“What if we can’t?”

“What if we can?” Desperation bled into her voice, and, hearing it, she bit her tongue.

Soul thinned his lips into a frown. He looked like he wanted to argue, but kept his mouth shut. Either he did not know what to say, or he was afraid to say it.

Maka chewed the inside of her lip. “Please, Soul?” she said, lifting her hand from his chest. “I just want this to be over.”

The steady thump of his heartbeat quickened when she traced the tips of her fingers down his cheek. His eyes, dragged half-shut by dark circles, lingered on hers for a moment before rolling up to the ceiling. “What do you want me to do?” he asked.

And Maka said, “I want you to close your eyes.” The words left her tongue before she could think too much of them; she knew that if she gave herself time to do so, she would have said nothing at all.

Soul’s fingers fidgeted in her shirt. “Close—?”

Then she touched her thumb to his lip. A feeling like static crackled down the strings between them; she felt it all through her, from her fingers down to her toes.

“Trust me,” she said, and he did. He shut his eyes tight, furrowing his brow, and Maka had to bite back a laugh.

Oh, Soul, she thought, and after a moment, she closed her eyes, too.

He tasted like sleep. He sighed into her kiss, making a sound low in his throat, and Maka crinkled her nose at the morning breath that gushed against her lips. “Soul,” she murmured, and no sooner had his name left her lips than she heard his breath hitch. Then her voice was smothered by another kiss, long and fervent, and then another, and another.

Soul clutched handfuls of her shirt, tugging her close, breathing her in, and she melted into him. Her soul—every part of her—reached out to him, straining, wanting, and he kissed her like he had never wanted anything more.

A dizzy, airy feeling swirled around her head, down into her chest and through her belly. She felt weightless again, as if held up by little strings. Something heavy was gone from inside her, and it took her a moment to realize what it was: the tangle of things in the bottom of her stomach. There was something else there now: something familiar, like a warm touch; like home.

Sparks came alive in the empty dark, and between them, she felt something give way.

Behind her eyelids, she could see light, and on her skin, she felt warmth. She felt Soul’s arms around her, and heard his heart beating in time with her own. When she opened her eyes, she found warm red looking back at her, and for a moment, she was so caught up in them, red was all she could see.

And then there was black.

Black rolled down the scarlet curtains, bleeding like watercolor onto the tile floor. Little, jittering things threw their long, inky silhouettes on the velvet, and when Maka glanced out of the corner of her eye, she could see them dancing, too.

Soul bumped his forehead softly into hers. “Eyes on me,” he said through ragged breaths. “If you see something move, don’t look at it.”

“Something?” said Maka.

“I don’t know what,” said Soul. “Anything.”

Fear that was not her own reverberated through her. It flickered like the little blue lights that dotted the room, twitching and fidgeting around inside her, wanting her to move. It was strange. There was nothing to be afraid of. It was quiet there, except for the smooth sound of music—the kind Soul liked to listen to—and the soft thump of his heart beating next to hers. It kept up a quick, anxious rhythm, out of time with the song, and it confused her footsteps. She was not sure which beat to follow.

“Now your hands are shaking,” she said, rubbing her thumb across his cheek.

“I know,” said Soul.

“Nothing here is gonna hurt you.”

“Not me I’m worried about.”

A sharp, chittering laughter mixed with the music for a moment. It was there and gone in the beat of a heart. Soul sucked in a breath, turning his head to look at…whatever it was, she supposed, that he did not want her to see.

She looked, too. There was nothing there.

“Soul,” she said softly.

Still, he kept his eyes fixed on the shadows. It was a slow caress of his cheek that coaxed his gaze away, and when his eyes found hers again, she said, “It’s okay.”

He did not look like he believed her.

“I’m not scared,” she murmured. “You shouldn’t be, either.”

With that, she draped her arms over his shoulders and, standing up on her toes, kissed him on the nose. He scrunched up his face, bright red in the blue light.

“I got you,” said Maka. “I’m not gonna let anything happen to you.”

A smile struggled at the corners of his lips. It was a small, soft smile, meant to reassure her; tell her without words that it was okay, and that she did not have to worry. Then he lifted a hand, tangling his fingers in her hair, and pulled her head down to rest on his shoulder. She closed her eyes again, losing herself in the thump of his heartbeat while he pressed a long kiss into her hair.

“You stay right here,” he said, “and we’re both gonna be fine.”

All night, while the two of them lie tangled in each other’s arms, their souls danced together in the dark. Something danced alongside them, too. Never once did she see it, but she could feel it all around them. It was a slimy, slithering, squirming thing, hiding in the shadows that flickered on the curtains, and in the dark that lurked behind the dim blue light. It was in the music, and the silence. It was in everything, and it was going nowhere.

She was not afraid of it. Soul was, but she was not.

It could touch her if it wanted. It could twist its fingers into her skin; breathe its cold breath into her lungs; bleed its nightmares into her head. She could take it. She had seen it, and she had felt it, and whatever it was, it did not frighten her anymore.

Nightmares were just nightmares, and though they may keep coming, she was ready to face them.

Together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art in this chapter was made by @alcruid and @Bearmageddon!


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